Mound, Pullagh, Co. Clare
Co. Clare |
Ritual/Ceremonial
On a south-facing slope in the Burren, Co. Clare, there is a low, roughly horseshoe-shaped mound that nobody can quite explain.
Measuring about 9.5 metres along its longer axis, it curves into two gentle arms that enclose a shallow depression, with the open end facing west-northwest, where what remains of the enclosing structure has almost entirely disappeared into the ground. It sits just above the extraordinary karst landscape of the Burren, that expanse of exposed limestone pavement, glacially smoothed and fissured, which stretches away to the north-east. The mound is mostly sod-covered, with angular rocks breaking the surface here and there, and it is better preserved on its eastern and south-western side, where it still reaches about half a metre in height, than on the opposite arc, where it has been reduced to a barely perceptible rise.
What makes this feature genuinely puzzling is that its form does not fit neatly into any single category. The penannular, or almost-ring, shape and the enclosed hollow suggest it may once have been a small circular hut, a simple dry-stone structure that has gradually collapsed inward over centuries. Alternatively, it may be the degraded remains of a much longer mound, one end of which has eroded away to almost nothing. The surrounding hillslope is scattered with loose rock, which complicates reading the site further, since it is difficult to distinguish deliberate construction from natural accumulation. It may correspond to one of three mounds recorded in the Record of Monuments and Places in 1996. A cairn, a more clearly defined stone heap of probable prehistoric origin, lies roughly 79 metres to the east, suggesting this part of the Burren slope was meaningful to people over a long period, even if the precise nature of that meaning has become harder to read with time.