Rock art, Rossacoosane, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On the lower eastern slopes of Knockanaskil mountain in County Kerry, almost flush with the surrounding ground, lies a flat sandstone outcrop that has accumulated several quite different layers of meaning.
Locally it is called the Oscar Stone, said to mark the grave of Oscar, grandson of the legendary hero Fionn Mac Cumhaill. The prehistoric carvings on its surface are what first attract attention, but a closer look reveals that not everything carved here is ancient, and separating the genuinely old from the relatively recent is part of what makes the stone genuinely interesting.
The outcrop, located in an area known as Poulacapple, was uncovered in 1904 when its covering of earth was removed, and a report published in 1906 described what lay beneath. Rock art of this type typically dates to the Bronze Age and consists of cup-and-ring marks, which are exactly what they sound like: shallow circular depressions, sometimes surrounded by one or more carved concentric rings, sometimes connected by a radiating groove. The Oscar Stone carries several such motifs, including a cup-and-two-ring design and a simpler cup-and-ring, along with isolated cupmarks and curvilinear grooves that, in the northern section of the stone, intersect to form something resembling a grid. Much of the surface is now obscured by moss and encroaching grass, making the prehistoric carvings difficult to read clearly. Complicating matters further, a nearby forge was operating on the same farm in the 1840s, and Lynch's 1906 account noted that workmen appear to have used the stone's surface to sharpen and prepare their tools. Some of the rougher pickmarks scattered across the stone, and a series of marks on an adjacent boulder to the west that seem to imitate the genuine rock art, are thought to date from that period rather than prehistory.
The stone sits in improved pasture about 160 metres above sea level, with farm buildings roughly 30 metres to the west and a tertiary road about 10 metres to the east. An ash tree growing beside the adjacent boulder acts as a useful marker for locating both stones.