Skaghabanoo, ritual site in County Clare

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What is recorded here

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Named ‘Skaghavanoo’ on the OS 25-inch plan (1897) - which appears to show its location at the junction of two later field boundaries c. 9m to the NW of a rath (CL017-088002-) - and similarly recorded on the Cassini edition (1916) of the OS 6-inch map. A holy bush noted by Westropp (1900-2, 139; No. 44) who recorded that, ‘ … the head of a bossed Celtic cross (CL017-088003-) and the holy bush which gives the place its name, remain near a large rath [CL017-088002-], with a Man-made underground passage [CL017-088004-] …’ MacNamara (1900, 31-2) suggested that the fort’s name, ‘Skaghavanoo’ could be translated as ‘Sceach an bheannuighte’, or The Whitethorn of the Blessing’. It is unclear if the tree described by Westropp still survives, but Houlihan (2016, 43) noted ‘a number of aged whitethorns’ at the site, one of which he suggested may be the “sceach”.

From the National Monuments Service (Archaeological Survey of Ireland) record CL017-088001

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Photo credits

Maker not stated on source page, www.dreamstime.com
Maker not stated on source page, en.wikipedia.org
Roger Diel, Geograph · Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0
Roger Diel, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
Brian Nelson, Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
The Banner, Wikimedia Commons
Maker not stated on source page, www.pinterest.com

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