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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Rock art

Letter West, County Kerry, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Rock art, Letter West, County Kerry, with a pin at the register's coordinates
Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915), covering this location. Courtesy of the National Library of Scotland. The pin is ours, placed from the register's coordinates.

The record

Townland
Letter West
County
Kerry
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Not indicated
Latest-edition OS map
Not indicated
Coordinates
52.01264, -10.01099
SMR number
KE071-133----

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

4 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1753 map "Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae" (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

Historical maps covering this location

  • 1753 · Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1869 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

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This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗

The National Monuments Service's description

Rock art identified and described by Aoibheann Lambe as; '10m north of a stream in boggy upland pasture looking upslope at south-west to Mullaghnarakill hill between Coomnacronia and Coomeglaslaw lakes and at north-east past Laughtshee towards Castlemaine Harbour, the upper surface of a roughly rectangular shaped sandstone rock outcrop measuring c. 7m long on its NE/SW axis and c. 2.5m wide, is inscribed with 8 rosettes, 15+ cup-and-rings, 20+ cupmarks as well as meandering grooves some of which intersect each other and some of which enclose one or more motifs. The rosettes are composed of a central cupmark (D c. 4cm) enclosed by a ring (D c. 10cm) of evenly spaced mini-cupmarks (D 2cm). In 5 instances, the ring is composed of 7 mini-cupmarks, in two instances the ring has 9 mini-cupmarks and there is one mini-rosette composed of a mini-cupmark enclosed by a ring of 5 dimples. The cup-and-rings and cupmarks (some of which are oval or sub-circular in shape) occur in groups, singly or in association with rosettes'.

See attached photographs courtesy of Aoibheann Lambe

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien based on details provided by Aoibheann Lambe

Date of upload: 7 October 2022

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Sites and Monuments Record data: National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Record text is reproduced unchanged. National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
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