Standing stone, Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Stone Monuments

Standing stone, Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

Some ancient stones are remarkable for what they are.

This one is perhaps more remarkable for what it no longer is. A standing stone that once rose roughly 1.8 metres from rough pasture ground in Cloghera More, on the Iveragh Peninsula in County Kerry, has apparently been removed, most likely sometime around the turn of the twenty-first century. It left behind no official cartographic trace, having never appeared on Ordnance Survey maps, and its absence is now known mainly through local word of mouth.

Standing stones are among the most common yet most enigmatic monuments in the Irish landscape, erected variously during the Bronze Age or early medieval period for purposes that remain debated, whether as boundary markers, burial indicators, or focal points for ritual. This particular example stood in rough pasture to the south-east of the Owenroe river, not far from a site known as Ooangallaun Cave. Its omission from the OS maps suggests it was either overlooked during the original surveys or considered too minor to record, which makes its subsequent physical disappearance all the more complete. The stone was documented by Aidan O'Sullivan and Jerry Sheehan in their 1996 archaeological survey of the Iveragh Peninsula, published by Cork University Press, where it appears as entry number 229. That publication remains one of the more thorough attempts to catalogue the dense and varied archaeology of South Kerry, a region where prehistoric monuments turn up in field corners and riverbanks with some regularity.

There is, in a quiet way, something instructive about a monument that survived millennia only to be lost within living memory, unrecorded on any map, its removal noted only in conversation. The landscape around the Owenroe river continues as it was, but the stone itself is gone.

Rated 0 out of 5

Visitor Notes

Review type for post source and places source type not found
Added by
Picture of Pete F
Pete F
IrishHistory.com is passionate about helping people discover and connect with the rich stories of their local communities.
Please use the form below to submit any photos you may have of Standing stone, Cloghera More, Co. Kerry. We're happy to take any suggested edits you may have too. Please be advised it will take us some time to get to these submissions. Thank you.
Name
Email
Message
Upload images/documents
Maximum file size: 100 MB
If you'd like to add an image or a PDF please do it here.

Advertisement