Crannoge — Ballydawley

In the shallow waters of Ballygawley Lough, c. 100m from the SE shoreline. The land surrounding the lake is part of a forest known as Union Wood. A roughly circular high-cairn crannog (27m N-S; 30.3m E-W; H 3m above the sandy muddy lake-bed) on the S half of which is a mid-cairn (6m N-S; 9m E-W). The mid-cairn consists of moderately to well-packed stones with a number of flagstones and rises c. 0.75m above a surrounding plateau. The S edge of the crannog drops distinctly down to the water. A plateau (max. Wth 7m) of loosely packed subangular to rounded stones (diam. 0.2-0.4m), with smaller blackened angular stones in between, surrounds the mid-cairn W-E. The plateau is surrounded by a stone-built berm (Wth 4-8m). At W the plateau is connected to the berm via a stone-built ramp (L 12m N-S; Wth 2.5m). The ramp is mainly stone rubble, but a stone wall is evident along its W edge. The edges of the crannog are stone and are distinct in material and they seem to feather out from the berm. There is an overspill of stones for c. 2m into the water around the perimeter of the crannog. A number of horizontal timbers are visible at NNE and animal bones were also found in the berm in the same area. Wood-Martin (1886, 246-8) mentioned traces of an encircling palisade, mortised beams as well as animal bones here. Apart from the horizontal timbers there are no visible remains of the palisade or mortised beams. This crannog is named 'Sallow Island' on the 1838 OS 6-inch map. A possible crannog (SL020-269----) is c. 60m to S. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Sligo' compiled by Ursula Egan, Elizabeth Byrne, Mary Sleeman with Sheila Ronan and Connie Murphy (Dublin Stationery Office, 2005). Date of upload: 18 January 2008