Barrow - unclassified

The National Monuments Service's description

Monument surveyed in 2015 and described by McGuinness (2015, 34) as following: ‘Monument consists of an approximately square mound (6.5m N-S x 6.8m E-W) with slightly rounded corners (due to erosion), flat top (3.5m NS x 3.3m E-W) and steeply sloping sides, its two axes aligned NNW-SSE (N-S here) and ENE-WSW (E-W here); no trace of a ditch is apparent. Where thickest on W side, it rises 0.76m above ground level; it is most massive here, arguably so that upper surface of mound would appear approximately level despite ground surface sloping down to W. Mound is well preserved except for NE corner, where there has been extensive damage and some small boulders exposed. Flat upper surface of mound slopes down gently from W to E; a slight depression at centre could indicate either ransacking or a collapsed chamber, but more likely it relates to an episode from recent decades, as an ASI fieldworker was informed by the landowner on 18/5/71 that ‘a few years ago one of his farm labourers dug into the mound and found a lot of bones’. Although minuscule, this flat-topped mound is most prominently positioned on the flat summit of a striking, steep-sided glacial hillock with stepped base on its W side, the highest of several in the area; visibility is excellent in all directions. A gigantic erratic stands isolated in a field c. 250m to ENE; a large gravel quarry is visible a few fields to S. This unusual rectilinear mound is not obviously a barrow: As one ASI fieldworker described it on 18/5/71: Barrow? A small, low, sub-circular, steep flat-topped mound of stony earth. It looks as if it is a very modern platform. Its significance is unknown. [SMR file]. The account of 10/6/80, while acknowledging its angular shape, is also sceptical: A small, low, sub-rectilinear, flat-topped mound of earth & stones. There is no visible sign of a fosse. The sides of the mound are relatively steep on the N, S & W, but on the E the mound is somewhat defaced & it slopes gradually there. The N, S & W sides are almost straight & it looks as if the mound has been scarped at some time in the relatively recent past. [SMR file] Nonetheless, this monument in which bones have been found is very strikingly located on a glacial hillock with excellent visibility, a type of location common for barrows in this and other counties; and the recognition of what appears to be a second, prominently sited rectilinear barrow at Pass of Kilbride (WM034-004----), only c. 8km to SW, seems to suggest that it is indeed a barrow, albeit of a hitherto unknown type in Ireland’.

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien based on details provided by David McGuinness.

Date of upload: 5 February 2016

References

McGuinness, D. 2015 The prehistoric burial mounds and related monument of County Westmeath. Part III - Monuments in Northern and Eastern Westmeath (Baronies of Delvin and Fore, and Parts of Baronies of Farbill, Fartullagh, Moygoish, and Moyashel & Magheradernon). Unpublished survey funded by Westmeath County Council in association with Westmeath Archaeological and Historical Society.