Standing stone, Coarha Beg, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Stone Monuments

Standing stone, Coarha Beg, Co. Kerry

On Valentia Island, off the south-west tip of Kerry, a single upright stone sits in a field of gently sloping pasture, roughly two hundred metres from the edge of Emlagh bog.

It does not appear on Ordnance Survey maps. Locals call it a gallaun, the Irish term for a standing stone set up as a solitary monument, as distinct from those arranged in rows or circles, and it is easy to walk past without knowing it carries any particular significance at all.

The stone itself is modest in scale but oddly proportioned. At its base it measures 1.44 metres by 0.75 metres, oriented east to west, and it tapers slightly as it rises to a maximum height of 1.1 metres. The base is irregular rather than squared off, suggesting it was chosen and placed rather than shaped. Who put it there, and when, is unrecorded. Standing stones of this kind are generally understood to date from the Bronze Age, though firm dating for individual gallauns is rarely possible without excavation. What makes this one quietly notable is precisely its anonymity: no map reference, no official marker, just a stone in a field that local knowledge has kept named and known.

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Pete F
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