Burial ground in An Luinnigh

Maeve Sikora of the NMI travelled to Gweedore, Co. Donegal to investigate a report of discovery of human remains in a sand quarry at Lunniagh, Bunbeg, Co. Donegal. The site had been previously visited on behalf of the National Museum by a member of staff of Donegal County Museum, Ms Caroline Carr. On May 3rd, I met Caroline Carr at Gweedore, where she handed over a small box containing a vertebra - possibly human and one vertebra of a small animal which she had collected from the site on Friday, April 30th. When we arrived to the area in which the bones were, and noticed immediately that the remains had been removed. When last examined the site, skeletal remains had been visible in the section of the sand dune, 2-3 metres (estimated) from the surface. The section was eroding as we looked at it but it was clear that the remains had been removed recently by hand (fresh damp sand was visible in the area, clearly having been removed from the section). Investigation of the disturbed sand found no trace of bone or other artefacts. We also cleaned down the section around the site of the burial but did not locate any further remains or trace of grave structure. A local man had apparently told Caroline Carr that some 20 years ago he had found ' a stone oven containing burnt material' (a Bronze Age cist?) (DG032-012002-), so I was also looking for stones which might indicate the presence of a cist, but none was visible. Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien Date of upload/revision: 07 May 2010