The Carlingford Culture

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Abstract
This paper is devoted to a study of the horned-cairns of the North-east of Ireland and their associated artifacts. The term ‘horned-cairn’ is used to describe those segmented gallery-graves set in a long cairn and entered from a semi-circular forecourt delimited by an orthostatic facade. It is realized that this term is not altogether satisfactory, but it has the virtue of brevity and its usage is now well established. Some contemporary Irish prehistorians, notably Professor Ruaidhrí de Valéra, have suggested the term ‘court-cairn’ for all the manifestations in Ireland of the segmented gallery-grave having elaborate structural forecourts. This would include cairns in the West of Ireland with completely enclosed courts (described as court-cairns in this paper) as well as horned-cairns proper. The confusion which might arise from the use of such terms as ‘full court-cairn’, ‘half court-cairn’, ‘forecourt-cairn’ and the like have decided the present writer to retain in this paper the simple terms ‘horned-cairn’ and ‘court-cairn’.This study is divided into two main sections. The first is descriptive, being concerned with horned-cairns and associated artifacts and the second attempts to place the Carlingford Culture as a whole in its context in prehistory. In view of the paucity of detailed information about court-cairns, particularly the almost complete lack of excavation, no detailed study is made of these. At the time of going to press it is understood that a paper by Professor de Valéra on the court-cairns of the west is about to be published in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy.

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