It's always good practice to go to a roadside site expecting very little. If you do that with this little portal tomb you'll be in for a big surpise, because it's lovely!!! I was amazed - I had seen some poor photos of it on the internet but they had not quite prepared me for the utter cuteness of this nobbly beast.
The drive to here was an interesting one. I spent most of the journey leaning forward with my nose pressed up againt the windscreen peering into the fog, but as I approach Leitrim it started to break up and I was to be treated to sun for the rest of the day.
Anyway, back to this little unsung gem. It is situated in a little roadside niche under a nice big tree. The 2m x 1.6m capstone is wonderfully bummpy and featuresome (now there's a new word!) and oh so very, very tactile.
The whole thing is wonderfully intact, with some minor collapsing of one of the chamber walls. The two portal stones highlight a great archetectural feature of the tomb. The capstone is stepped along the front edge and to compensate for this the portal stones are of unequal height (1.6m and 1.3m), thus making the capstone level. Brilliant!
Why this one hasn't been more highly praised is beyond me. A lovely, lovely little tomb, only let down slightly by its immediate roadside position.
Click Thumbnail to View Full Size Image
_
_
_
_
_On the way to revisiting this monument I had tried to locate the very ruined portal tomb in the townland of Melkagh, but failed. I wanted to see how they both related to Corn Hill (County Longford). This one is located such that the hill seems to occupy a position on the top of a nearby low ridge. It's as if the hill has been kidnapped and moved in the landscape to be closer. If this was an intention of the builders (and I think it probably was) then the spot has been chosen very carefully. If it wasn't intentional then it's a lovely conincidental effect!
Click Thumbnail to View Full Size Image
_
_
_
_All Sites Visited On 18th September 2005 « Previous Site Next Site »
I really should put a big marks next to this site on the OS map. I keep coming back here not remembering which on it is. The problem is that the site is right next to a fold in the map and the townland name is over the fold.
The light was very different to any other time I've been here so I was able to take some more photos of it looking slightly different.
Click Thumbnail to View Full Size Image
_
_
_
_A Random Selection of Nearby Monuments
 Whitestown East (Co. Waterford) |  Ballybrack (Co. Dublin) |  Aghanlish (Co. Leitrim) |
 Haroldstown (Co. Carlow) |  Cleenrah or Cleenrath (Co. Longford) |  Glenknock (Co. Tyrone) |
