What is recorded here

Crannog is a semi-circular stake row on the south shore of Inchiquin Island, built to push the land further into Inchiquin Lough. Macnamara saw stakes three or four inches wide planted in the marly bottom, both ends touching shore, with the enclosed space filled by stones and rubbish. The island was extended to the south, and its shores still carry stones that may have been squared by hammer. A tower house stands elsewhere on the island, while the crannog remains a small act of human ambition: making more land where water refused to give it up.

At the S shore of Inchiquin Island in Inchiquin Lough. Described by Macnamara (1901a, 210) as ‘a semi-circular row of stakes, 3 or 4 inches in diameter’, seen at low water defining the edge of a semicircular extension of the island. He stated that the stakes ‘were planted in the marly bottom, both ends of the row touching the shore, and the enclosed space was filled with stones and rubbish’ and by then adding another semicircular extension to this artificial platform, ‘the island was very much extended to the south’ (ibid.). He also noted that the shores of the island ‘are littered with stones, many of which may have been squared by the hammer’, and that 50 or 60 years before his time of writing, there was ‘such a large collection of bones of deer and other animals, in fact a subaqueous kitchen-midden, on the eastern side [of the island] near the boat-slip, that a sort of regular trade existed to fish up and sell them.’ (ibid.) On a plan Macnamara published (1901b, 349) he recorded oval-shaped and linear rows of stakes on the shoreline and in shallow water as well as some ‘squared piles’. There is a tower house (CL017-059002-) also on Inchiquin Island. Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy and Conn Herriott Date of upload: 13-10-2025

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