What is recorded here

Elevated pasture on Ballyallaban Hill still holds a wedge-shaped chamber where a cracked roofstone spans four metres above a grassed cairn. The northern sidestone leans outward with a dressed upper edge, while broken southern fragments lie propped beside the tomb like discarded thoughts. People may have placed the dead inside that narrowing space or simply watched the sky tilt through its gap, but the stones still force the eye to follow their slope.

In elevated pasture on the S-facing slope of Ballyallaban Hill with clear views from SE to SW. Within a multiperiod field system (CL005-104001-). Indicated and named ‘Cromlech’ on the 1839 and 1916 OS 6-inch maps. A well-preserved wedge tomb aligned E-W and centrally placed within a grassed-over cairn. The following details are derived from de Valera and Ó Nualláin (1961, 7). The tomb comprises a N sidestone, the remains of a S sidestone, a W doorstone, and single large roofstone, defining a wedge-shaped chamber (L 4m; H 0.9-2m; Wth 0.9-1.3m) broadest and highest to the W, and narrowing and lowering to the E. The N sidestone (L 3.75m; H 1.95m; T 0.1-0.25m) leans slightly outwards and is vertically cracked c. 1.5m from its E end. Its upper edge is dressed and slopes sharply down to the E. Small packing stones are visible along the base of the stone. The S sidestone survives only as two ex-situ slab fragments propped along the S side of the tomb. Both fragments appear to derive from the broken sidestone, which Westropp noted had ‘collapsed since 1862’ (1899, 381). The W slab (L 1.4m; H 1.35m; T 0.25m) has a straight top edge, but its other edges appear broken. A second slab fragment to the E (L 1.65m; H 1.15m; T 0.15m) also appears to be derived from the broken sidestone. The S side of the tomb has been partially built up with drystone walling from a boundary flanking the S side of the monument. The W end of the chamber is closed by a cracked doorstone (L 2.1m; H 1.85m; T 0.1-0.2m), on which the roofstone now rests. The roofstone (L 4.25m; Wth 0.9-1.95m; T 0.2m) widens from E to W and is cracked c. 0.75m from its E end. A well-set slab (L 0.65m; H 0.6m; T 0.1-0.15m) runs partially across the E end of the chamber. The tomb is set within a cairn (c. 8m N-S; c. 10m E-W; H 0.7m), which has been partially quarried to the S. Four upright slabs (L 0.4-1.2m; H 0.1-0.5m) are set within the cairn W of the doorstone. They may be the remnants of a stone kerb or be related to a later field wall which abuts the cairn. Compiled by: Mary Tunney and Eve Campbell Date of upload: 21 October 2025 See linked document with details from Ruaidhrí de Valera and Seán Ó Nualláin, Survey of the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland. Volume I. County Clare. (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1961). Date of upload: 24 December 2011

Wedge tomb, dating to the Late Neolithic or Early Bronze Age (c. 2500–1000 BCE). Its location within a multiperiod landscape and early map references highlight its long-standing cultural and topographic significance.

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