What is recorded here

Standing stone in Caherkeen is a prostrate rectangular stone in County Cork, Ireland, known locally as the head marker of a giant’s grave. Its upper surface carries eleven cupmarks and one cup-and-ring, as if someone counted, marked or worshipped there before the story changed the stones into a buried body. The smaller foot stone is gone, but the head stone still lies in open pasture, keeping the giant half-remembered and the field quietly larger than it looks.

In pasture with commanding view to S. Prostrate rectangular stone (L 1.6m; 0.9m x 0.58m) known locally to mark head of giant's grave. Smaller stone 12m to SE now removed marked his feet. The upper surface of the stone (1.6m NW-SE; 0.9m NW-SW; H 0.58m) displays three cupmarks (diam. 4-6cm; D 1.5-3cm), one of which has faint traces of a ring, along its NW end. A further eight cupmarks (diam. 5-8cm; D 2-4cm) and one cup-and-ring (diam. 19 cm) are displayed on the SE half of the stone. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Cork. Volume 1: West Cork' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1992). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. Date of upload/revision: 14 January 2009

Probably dating to the early medieval or later period, this standing stone reflects a tradition of landscape markers associated with folklore, in this case a giant's grave. Such stones often held local spiritual or commemorative significance, blending myth with territorial markers.

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