What is recorded here

Rock art in Rathgeran, County Carlow, appears on a small granite boulder beside a field fence, facing the Blackstairs and Mount Leinster. Twenty-two shallow cup marks dot one flat surface, while plough scores suggest the stone once lay lower and wider beneath a working field. Its original location has been lost, but the cups still catch light on a slope where people may have marked time, ownership, prayer or memory before the land changed around them.

Sitting alongside a field fence, on a gentle SE facing slope with good views of the Blackstairs to the SE, and Mount Leinster and Knockroe to the NE. A small granite boulder (L 0.72m; Wth 0.35m; T 0.2m) with 22 cup marks (average diam. 4cm; D 0.5cm - 2cm) visible on one flat surface. The surface is also scored with plough marks, indicating that the stone was originally a low-level, recumbent slab. Original location unknown. Compiled by: Claire Breen and Chris Corlett Date of upload: 4 October 2011

Likely dating to the Neolithic or Bronze Age, the 22 cup marks on the granite boulder may have held ritual or symbolic significance, possibly related to water, fertility, or celestial observations. Such rock art is often associated with wider landscape features and may have been part of a local ceremonial or navigational system.

The monument record does not grant public access. Check the route and ask the landowner before entering private land.