Mysterious Britain & Ireland

Category: Burial Mounds

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds

Llety’r Filiast

Llety’r Filiast translates into English as "The Lair of the Greyhound Bitch". It is a ruined Neolithic burial chamber situated on the Great Orme. Most of the stone from the cairn has been taken over the years, but it is thought that when it was originally built it would have measured thirty metres long and ten metres wide, and been vaguely egg shaped.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds

Capel Garmon Burial Chamber

Located to the south of the village of Capel Garmon, signposted and in a farmer’s field, are the remains of an ancient Neolithic chambered cairn. It is estimated that the ruins are around 5,000 years old, and it was excavated sometime between 1925 and 1927. It has a curved passage approximately fifteen feet long and four feet high, and two circular burial chambers to the east and west.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds

Lligwy Burial Chamber

The remains of the Lligwy Cromlech probably date from around 5000 BC (late Neolithic period). Access to the main central chamber would have been through a small narrow passage. The massive capstone (supported by eight smaller pillar stones), measures eighteen feet by fifteen feet, and is estimated to weigh twenty-five tons.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds

Carneddau Hengwm

The Carneddau Hengwm are a couple of quite large tumuli or Neolithic burial chambers that are about two and half miles inland from Llanaber off the A496 Meirionnydd coastal road between Barmouth and Harlech. They lie in an East to West alignment, about fifty yards apart and at an altitude of 900 feet.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds / Giants / King Arthur / Legends

Arthur’s Stone

Arthur’s Stone is the name given to the remains of a Neolithic chambered tomb. Aged around 5000 years old (3700BC – 2700BC), the monument consists of a huge cap stone weighing over 25 tonnes and nine upright stones.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds / Fairies / Folklore / Irish Fairies / Legends

Sheebeg Cairn

Sheebeg Cairn (Sí Beag) is traditionally considered to be the burial site of Gráinne, (daughter of Cormac mac Airt, High King of Ireland ) and the giant hero of Irish legend, Fionn Mac Cumhaill (or Finn McCool), leader of the Fianna warriors of Ben Bulben.

Ancient Sites / Apparitions / Burial Mounds / Folklore / Hauntings

Weeton Cairn Boggart

In the 1876 book entitled ‘History of the Fylde of Lancashire’ by John Porter, reference is made to an extensive barrow or cairn near Weeton Lane Heads which was accidentally opened. This burial chamber had the reputation of being haunted by a boggart or hairy ghost.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds / Irish Folktales

Knockinarea

Knockinarea is the name of the prominent mountain on the Cuil Irra peninsula to the west of Sligo, County Sligo. The name of the hill has been interpreted as: The Hill of the King, The Hill of the Moon and The Hill of the Executioner amongst other things, and dominates the views from miles around.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds

Dyffryn Ardudwy Cromlechs

Behind the local school at Dyffryn Ardudwy and reached by a sign posted footpath two exposed cromlechs are visible amidst a field of stones. The cromlechs are about twenty feet apart and the stones that surround them mark the remains of the huge cairn that would have covered these graves that date back to the Neolithic period.

Ancient Sites / Burial Mounds / King Arthur / Legends

Cors-y-Gedol Burial Chamber

The Cors-y-Gedol burial chamber which still has it’s capstone intact is also referred to as Arthur’s Quoit and can be found close to some ancient hut circles known as the Irishmen’s huts on the slope of Moelfre.