Poulnabrone Dolmen

Liam Shortall

Location

Poulnabrone Dolmen is a portal tomb located on high ground in the limestone landscape of Burren, Co. Clare just off the Ballyvaughan to Corofin road, the R480. Its location is thought to have been picked as a territorial marker.

Location map for Poulnabrone Dolmen. Data from the basemap gallery accessed on the Heritage Maps Viewer at www.heritagemaps.ie 26-6-2023

Placename

The placename Poulnabrone comes from the Irish ‘Poll na Brón’ which means the Hole of the Quernstone. Sometimes it is incorrectly translated as the Hole of Sorrows.

What is it?

Poulnabrone Dolmen Photo courtesy of Zena Hoctor

It is a burial place with 3 orthostats or side stones which support a huge capstone.

The side stones are 5 to 7 feet in height. The capstone is 13 feet in length, 6 feet to 10 feet wide and 1 foot in thickness. It weighs several tons. Another huge stone is on the ground behind the monument. It was previously fitted under the main cap stone and covered the back of the tomb. It fell down over time. Each of the stones which make up the monument were taken from the surrounding limestone pavement. 174 such portal tombs have been found around Ireland. Poulnabrone is the 2^nd largest of these

This megalithic or “great stone” tomb dates from the Neolithic period.

Neolithic

Neolithic stone age people were the 1^st farmers to inhabit the area. This later stone age period was from around 6,000 years to 4,000 years ago.

The Excavation

Archeological digs were carried out by Dr. Anne Lynch in 1986 and 1988. Radiocarbon dating carried out on bone fragments found that the site was in continuous use for around 600 years between 5,800 and 5,200 years ago. It is the oldest dated megalithic monument in Ireland. These excavations discovered the remains of 22 people (16 adults and 6 children). Analysis of the remains indicate that most people died before they turned 30 years of age. Recent research indicates that one of the bone fragments belonged to a six month old boy who had Down Syndrome. Incredibly the DNA in the remains were also found to be a match with the DNA of 3 local schoolchildren in the area.

Besides human and animal bone fragments a number of artefacts were found including a stone axe, arrowheads, beads, a bone pendant, quartz crystals and several bits of pottery. These artefacts are on display at Clare Museum in Ennis.