What is recorded here

Dermot and Granias Bed is a small wedge tomb set in a low mound on a rocky terrace between Gortaclare and Doomore, where one long stone still leans outward like a tired shoulder. It belongs to an extensive field system with enclosures that may have served as prehistoric farmsteads alongside the tomb. A man named Dermot may have tended that land, buried his dead there and watched the valley change around him.

Towards the S leading edge of a terrace of rough patchy grazing and bare rock pavement, in a valley between Gortaclare and Doomore mountains. A small WSW orientated and poorly preserved wedge tomb (chamber L 1.8m; Wth indeterminable) set in a low roughly circular mound (diam. 7m). The S sidestone (L 2.05m; H 1.05; T 0.15m) survives in situ but leans outward. Its upper edge is dressed and when in its original position it would have risen toward the WSW. A smaller stone (L 0.9m; H 0.85m T 0.1–0.25m) at the W end of the N side may be a remnant of the N sidestone. The backstone (L 1.15m; H 0.8m; T 0.15m) also remains in situ at the E end of the chamber. There are two stones at the E end of the chamber; a blocking stone (L 1.05m; H 0.75m; T 0.15m) and a second smaller parallel stone (L 0.85; 0.35m; T 0.1m), set some 0.4m further W. The smaller stone is likely a displaced doorstone. The capstone (L 1.5m; Wth 1.4m; T 0.1m) sits on the E end of the chamber and rests on the S sidestone, the backstone and the stone at the W end of the N side. When Westropp (Comber 2004, 60) recorded it there were two capstones. He also recorded a ‘curious little stone, shaped like a rough cross’ within it, of which there is no sign today (ibid.). The tomb is located at the centre of an extensive multiperiod field system (CL006-042001-) that encompasses three enclosures or ‘prehistoric farmsteads’ (CL006-098002-, CL006-144---- and CL006-146----) (Carey 2009). Comparisons with the dated enclosures or ‘farmsteads’ on Roughan Hill suggest that these and some of the mound walls of the field system (CL006-042001-) are likely contemporary with the wedge tomb (Jones et. al. 2011; Jones 2016). A complex of hut sites and small enclosures (CL006-042008-) are located c. 60m to the W. The following item has been attached: CL006-042009-_01.pdf Details from Ruaidhrí de Valera and Seán Ó Nualláin, Survey of the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland. Volume I. County Clare. (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1961). Compiled by: Mary Tunney and Ros Ó Maoldúin Date of upload: 14 September 2021

Wedge tomb, Late Neolithic or Early Bronze Age. Its orientation and location suggest it was part of a broader funerary and ritual landscape in the Burren region.

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