Landscape History: Journal of the Society for Landscape Studies 38:2 (2017).

Finn’s Seat: topographies of power and royal marchlands of Gaelic polities in medieval Ireland

Elizabeth FitzPatrick* and Ronan Hennessy**

* School of Geography and Archaeology, National University Ireland, Galway; [email protected] ** School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University College Cork; [email protected]

ABSTRACT

Hill- and mountain-top cairns and mounds in Ireland are often viewed as epiphenomenal features of the medieval landscape. In recent years, research on early medieval ferta, ancestral burial places cited in the legal procedure of taking possession of land and invoked during disputes over land, has highlighted the role of some sepulchral cairns and mounds in boundary maintenance. This paper proposes that particular cairns and mounds, imagined at least as early as the tenth century as Finn’s Seat (Suidhe Finn), acted as territorial markers in boundary formation and continuity, and signified royal marchlands (mruig ríg) where Gaelic kings went to hunt and to fight. It is argued that such lands were essentially forests, where a range of natural resources were available. A window onto royal marchlands is provided by the medieval Finn Cycle of Tales (fíanaigecht) which encodes knowledge of medieval territorial boundary zones in the names of the places where the quasi-mythical warrior- hunter and border hero, Finn mac Cumaill, works for the king of Ireland, hunts with his fían (wild band) and accesses the Otherworld.

KEYWORDS

Boundaries, fíanaigecht, Gaelic kingdoms, medieval landscape, marchland, mruig ríg, quasi-mythical, resource potential, royal, territory, threshold topographies

and mythologies, were manipulated by elites INTRODUCTION for high-status residential and ceremonial Elite power in Gaelic society of medieval landscapes, and for power display in battle and Ireland (fifth century to c. 1500) was intimately hunting. The aetiology of those relationships connected with significant topographies. and how they were expressed through time in Particular hills and mountains, rivers, valleys medieval territories is, as yet, thinly and woodlands, often with deep historicity

1 understood. This paper focuses on the use of person (Kelly 1988, p. 105). Archaeological particular hills and mountains as elite evidence in the form of early medieval deer- boundary landscapes where hunting and traps (Long & McCarthy 2009), depictions of fighting took place, paying special attention to hunting scenes on monumental sculpture, and the role of summit cairns and mounds as their laws relating to common rights that enabled focus-points. Why one mountain or hill and its law-abiding freemen to hunt deer, badgers lowland skirt was chosen over another as a and wolves (Kelly 1988, p. 106), all clearly medieval boundary landmark, a place to hunt indicate that hunting was a habitual activity. and fight, or to gather, lies at the heart of this The research project behind this paper enquiry. It is suggested that access to areas of proposes a means of finding hunting grounds natural resources, including earth materials, and concomitant natural resources in medieval woodland and hunted species, of which there Gaelic territories, areas that in other European was long-standing knowledge, combined with polities would be described as forestis or cultural resources in the form of prehistoric forest (Rollason 2016, p. 137; Beglane 2015, monuments, may have been among the pp. 9–10). The research arises from an ‘An primary reasons for those choices. The paper Atlas of Finn mac Cumaill’s Places’, a cross- is essentially a conceptual framework for disciplinary landscape-based project, which future fieldwork in medieval boundary investigates the topographies and landscapes, highlighting key attributes that archaeologies onto which place-names and merit further investigation. lore relating to the quasi-mythical warrior- It is a curious fact of the archaeology hunter, Finn, were layered in Ireland and and history of early medieval (fifth century to Scotland. c. 1000) Ireland that despite long-standing Finn and his fían or wild band of scholarship on royal landscapes, nothing has warriors are the central figures of fíanaigecht been written about hunting preserves of Irish (Finn Cycle of Tales), historically popular kings and little about the places where they among Gaelic-speaking peoples of Ireland, obtained earth materials, especially mineral Scotland and the Isle of Man. The tales were and metal ores and stone (Whitfield 1993). first documented from the eight century, This is, perhaps, partly attributable to a lack of perhaps, but it has been argued that their direct references to hunting and to control of maturity by that time implies a preceding oral mining and quarrying among Gaelic elites and tradition (Murray 2012, pp. 31–49; Nagy 1985, the potential spatial overlap between those pp. 1–3). They occur in the form of ballads and activities. The relative silence about royal lays, some composed as early as the eleventh hunting and mineral extraction in the Gaelic century. Ballads and lays became the foremost chronicles, for instance, might lead one to literary form by the late medieval period and believe that very little hunting took place, and among the most important collections of these that mining and quarrying were negligible in are the seventeenth-century Irish Duanaire Ireland between the fifth and twelfth Finn and those in the Scottish Book of the centuries. However, texts such as The Ancient Dean of Lismore dated to the sixteenth Laws of Ireland compiled in the seventh and century (Murray 2005, p. 166). The tales also eight centuries leave us in no doubt that occur in prose texts of the twelfth and mining and hunting took place. Laws of thirteenth centuries, among them Acallam na distraint refer to the crime of extracting Senórach (The Colloquy of the Ancients) and copper or iron ore from a cliff or excavating in Macgnímrada Find (The Boyhood Deeds of a silver mine on the property of another Finn). From the twelfth century, continuing

2 into the late medieval period, fíanaigecht was New ways of framing topographies the dominant literary genre in Gaelic culture and archaeologies associated with marginal and, arguably, the layering of place-names and and in-between places suggest that they were lore relating to Finn and his fían may have not outside of or ‘epiphenomenal to the main escalated from that time. structures of settlement in the landscape’, but Fíanaigecht is rich in place-names of places that may be interpreted as symbolic notable landforms in medieval kingdoms that topographies, often integral to the feature in the hunting and martial exploits of configuration of territory (Harmanşah 2014, the hero and his fían. There are also many pp. 3, 11). They can be brought back into view place-names associated with Finn that survive by looking at the nature of their topographies, in the modern landscape, recorded by the first archaeologies, bedrock and earth materials, in Ordnance Survey of the nineteenth century, by tandem with their place biographies and the the Civil Survey of the seventeenth century cultural and social practices that defined them. and earlier still on Tudor maps and in Gaelic In Ireland the Gaelic place-name documentary sources, but exactly when the Suidhe Finn (‘Finn’s seat’/ ‘white seat’), and layering of Finn lore onto particular landforms variants of it, are ascribed to the summits of and monuments first occurred is often difficult particular hills and low mountains (Fig. 1) in to pin down. boundary landscapes and especially to hill- and mountain-top cairns or earthen mounds (Ó FINN’S SEAT AS A BOUNDARY LANDMARK hÓgáin 1988, pp. 306–7). The meaning of Approaches to boundaries, borderlands and Suidhe Finn can be equivocal — it translates as frontiers in landscape archaeology are under- both ‘white seat’, and ‘Finn’s seat’. The origin developed generally, a point emphasised by of the word finn (Old Irish find) is believed to Curta (2005, pp. 1–9) in Borders, Barriers and lie in Common Celtic vindo meaning ‘white’ Ethnogenesis and by Mullin (2011, pp. 1–12) in (Sims-Williams 2006, pp. 123–4). It has been Places in Between. Archaeologies of suggested that where the vindo element boundaries have tended to focus less on their occurs in Celtic place-names in the European physicality and more on their political and landscape, it might relate to ‘god-names such military aspects, as well as interactions as that incorporated into place-names like between different ethnic and social groups. Vindobona at Vienna or to the Gallic The reality of boundaries in the past is Vindonnus and Welsh Gwynn, rather than to that they were often temporally and materially its primary meaning as “white” ’ (Murphy complex interactive spatial domains (Curta 1953, iii. lxxxii, lxxxiv). Williams (2016, pp. 196– 2005, pp. 2–5), which make them potentially 8) has raised this possible origin for Finn again. dynamic and revealing places for He points out that the Gallo-Roman god archaeological enquiry. The range and role of Vindonnus, identified with Apollo, ‘suggestively ‘in-between places’ is nuanced and intricate, contains the same element’, that the and this paper adds to that complexity by supernatural hunter, Gwynn, of Welsh introducing the concept of a king’s march in tradition is ‘linguistically cognate with Irish medieval Ireland. Some of the reasons why Finn’ and that the god Lug and Finn share particular marches of Gaelic territories were common themes. However, it may the case designated as topographies of royal power that there is no distinction to be made (Canepa 2014) appear to relate to their deep between ‘white seat’ and ‘Finn’s seat’, that historicity and natural resources. they may in fact be synonyms of each other, with the quasi-mythological Finn embodying

3 the qualities of finn/vindo places and possibly Choire Fhinn on Machrie Moor, Isle of Arran; even having his origin as a personification of and Suidheachan Fhinn on the western edge of them. While finn is usually translated as Beinn Tarsuinn in Wester Ross. Suidhe Finn something ‘white’, it is not the colour white locations in Ireland are more definitively but something ‘bright’, something exceptional, identified with cairns and mounds than their that appears to be intended (Quin 1990, p. counterparts in western Scotland. A hill 307). summit crowned with a cairn of possibly more There are thirty-seven instances of the recent origin defines Aite Suidhe Fhinn, while a place-name recorded to date in Ireland, stone circle on a knoll marks Suidhe Choire occurring in the anglicised forms Seefin, Fhinn, and a distinctive flat-topped outcrop of Seafin, Seein and as compound variants such rock differentiates Suidheachan Fhinn in its as Knockseefin and Carn Seefin (Table 1; Fig. mountain setting on the edge of Beinn 1). These constitute the main corpus of sites Tarsuinn. investigated in this paper, alongside five sites Suidhe Finn as a place-name is not well (Table 1; Fig. 1: 38, 39, 40, 41, 42) that present documented in Irish early medieval sources, similar profiles in respect of their topographies but one instance of early use does occur in a (hills, mountains) and archaeologies (cairns, topographical poem (dindshenchas) that is mounds) and which are variously celebrated in likely to have been composed in the tenth fíanaigecht as hunting grounds and century. Suide Find is cited in Brug na Bóinde II Otherworld sites that Finn and his fían (bank, hostel or womb of the Boyne, County frequent. The majority of the sites will be Meath), preserved in the Book of Leinster. It obscure to the reader, most of them have was possibly composed by the tenth-century never been written about, many of them are Cináed úa hArtacáin as it contains some of the no more than bare summits in intensively linguistic and metrical features (both Old and farmed, quarried or urbanised land, and where Middle Irish) found in the companion poem archaeology does occur in association with Brug na Bóinde I, which is ascribed to him and them it often tends to be underwhelming. It of that period (pers. comm. Marie-Luise must be stated from the outset that a pre- Theuerkauf). The relevant lines refer to the modern origin for the place-name Suidhe Finn mythological Buide having ‘planted his keen cannot, as yet, be confirmed for twenty-four stone in the portion which is called Finn’s Seat’ of the sites (Table 1), and the possibility that (Clandais Buide a liic laind/ ’sind raind some of them may be quite late copycat forsmbíd Suide Find) (Gwynn 1906, ii. 24, 25). attributions must be considered in any The quatrain refers to Suide Find, and what interpretation of their meaning. Within the appears to be a standing stone there, as a overall corpus there are ten sites (Table 1; Fig. place that is already well known and was 1: 17, 19, 20, 23, 27, 32, 39, 40, 41, 42) that probably, by that time, a mnemonic of the are especially celebrated in fíanaigecht and in River Boyne landscape (Fig. 2). local folklore, or that feature in other Gaelic What makes the majority of Suidhe literary texts and in the Irish chronicles, and Finn and related sites deserving of scholarly have complex archaeologies. The findings of attention are their historic boundary this paper are largely drawn from those. geographies. All forty-two sites have been There are three recorded instances of plotted onto territorial units called trícha céit, Suidhe Finn place-names in Scotland — Aite which were in existence by the eleventh Suidhe Fhinn, also known as Fingal’s Seat, west century (Fig. 1). Comparable to the English of Loch Portree on the Isle of Skye; Suidhe hundred, they are believed to have emerged

4 as ‘a refinement’ of existing territorial Finn, now Seefin Hill (Table 1; Fig. 1: 12), denominations. They were constituted by County Galway, is recalled as a point on the earlier túatha, political communities ruled by boundary of that kingdom (O’Donovan 1843, lords, and subdivided into bailte or estates pp. 4–6). (MacCotter 2008, pp. 22–4). The important Suidhe Finn in various anglicised forms point here is that the boundaries of trícha céit is also referenced in early modern maps of territories often incorporated those of earlier Ireland. The cartographer, John Speed, took túatha and sometimes coincided with key note of some on his maps of the provinces of boundary points of powerful overkingdoms. Ireland, 1610 (Speed 1611/12). Their inclusion Parts of their boundaries were, therefore, by him is somewhat unusual because integral to various levels of the hierarchy of antiquities were generally excluded from maps territories in medieval Ireland and can be of the period unless they were of strategic associated with pre-eleventh-century value to colonial concerns. Speed’s boundaries and with boundaries of incorporation of them as topographical overkingdoms as well as their constituent features suggests that they were recognised as client kingdoms. This can be seen, for instance, notable boundary landmarks into the in relation to Seefin Mountain, also known as seventeenth century. He presented the Cenn Abhrat, in the Ballyhoura Hills between important boundary cairn, Carn Seefin on the modern counties Limerick and Cork (Fig. Keeraunnageeragh Mountain on the north- 3). Historically, this mountain was situated on west shores of Lough Corrib in Connemara the southern boundary of a local kingdom (Fig. 4), as ‘Knock Siffingen’ on his map of the called Fonn Timchill, which translates as province of Connacht. Speed also marked ‘border land’ (MacCotter 2008, p. 189; 2006, ‘Knok Swiffyn’, east of the River Slaney pp. 69–70; Power 1932, pp. 47–9). It was boundary zone between the counties of bounded to the south by the local kingdom of Carlow and Wexford, on his map of the Fir Maige Méne, which translates as ‘men of province of Leinster. ‘Knock Swiffyn’ appears the plain of minerals’, but the mountain to be Gibbet Hill, the summit of which (315 landscape was also a boundary zone between metres O.D.) straddles the townlands of the rival overkingdoms of Tuadmuma and Corragh and Graiguemore in County Wexford, Desmuma in the province of Munster (Fig. 3). an area characterised geologically as a stripe of andesitic lavas and tuffs and green-grey and Boundary geography is the strongest dark blue-grey slate which is quarried. On his trend of Suidhe Finn place-name locations in map of the province of Munster, Speed Ireland. Thirty-eight of the forty-two (90.4 per marked ‘Caric Sulphyn’, ‘the rock of Finn’s cent) Suidhe Finn and related place-name seat’ in the Slieveardagh Hills, an upland rich in locations plotted on the map are disposed to coal on the County Tipperary–County Kilkenny boundary zones of trícha céit (Fig. 1). In some border and historic provincial boundary instances the place-name is cited explicitly in between Leinster and Munster. reference to landmarks used in the configuration of territorial boundaries, a BEDROCK AND FINN’S SEAT notable example of which occurs in a Williamson (2013, pp. 1–5, 36–60), in his study description of the bounds of the east of environment and society in early medieval Connacht regional kingdom of Uí Mhaine, England, has urged a refocusing of debates preserved in a sixteenth-century manuscript about landscape and settlement to called Criochairecht O Maine, where Suidhe incorporate meaningful engagement with the

5 natural environment. He presents ‘nature’s The River Boyne which formed a natural frame’ as an essential factor in human subdivision in the early medieval landscape, as settlement, as Hooke (2010; 1998) has it still does today, defined the southern extent demonstrated in relation to woodland for of the lands of the king of North Brega, a royal Anglo-Saxon England. The relationship title that is especially evident from the eight between nature’s frame and land use in century (Bhreathnach 2005, p. 415). medieval Ireland is, as yet, under-developed, Carrickdexter, at 125 metres above sea level, especially in respect of human perception of sandwiched between a great variety of bedrock geology. lithologies including shales and volcanics to The bedrock geology of Suidhe Finn the north and limestone and sandstone to the locations is variable, with a preponderance of south, would have stood out in the Boyne the sites (50 per cent) in limestone and landscape as an obvious landmark on the sandstone-mudstone geologies, five sites each western side of the low-lying expansive valley in granite and conglomerate sandstone (Fig. 2). Both Bhreathnach (2005, pp. 415, 422) locations, and another five in basalt and and Newman (2005, p. 361) have proposed andesite, just three in quartz, schist or slate, that internal ‘geo-physical characteristics’ and one lying in combined granite, schist and within overkingdoms would have predicated marble (Fig. 5). It is of interest, however, in boundaries between the territories of their relation to boundaries, that approximately 15 constituent peoples. Although Newman does per cent of Suidhe Finn places occur on or not specify Carrickdexter as part of the natural within 1.5 km of a lithological boundary that boundaries between his ‘Boyne valley marks a transition from calcareous to acidic landscape’ and ‘Blackwater landscape’ to the rock, typically reflected in changes in soil type west of it, he notes that the westerly limits of and surface vegetation and therefore the former ‘are often drawn where the Hill of recognisable as a boundary zone in the Slane encroaches on the Boyne around the landscape. Suidhe Finn locations also occupy present village of Slane, resulting in almost all of the isolated hilly inliers of volcanic constriction’ (ibid. pp. 371, 402–5). The rock that protrude from the extensively low- volcanic hill may have had a role in lying limestone midlands of the island. These demarcating the boundary between those include the Hill of Allen or Almhain (17), more localised landscapes as well as forming County Kildare, which consists of andesite lava, an iconic landmark which, at least from the and Knockseefin, at Pallasgrean, County tenth century, carried the name Suide Find Limerick, with its dramatic, outcropping basalt along the course of the River Boyne boundary fan structure (Fig. 6). The tendency for between the lands of the kings of North and volcanic geologies in Ireland and Scotland to South Brega. acquire Finn-related place-names suggests The bedrock of Almhain, Knockseefin that the celebrated Suide Find in the Boyne and Carrickdexter/Suide Find is noticeably Valley, County Meath, is the volcanic ridge of atypical — it does not conform to the greater Pighill and Carrickdexter in the former geological character of the surrounding demesne of Slane Castle, less than 1 km north- regions. The volcanic Croghan Hill, or west of the river and west of the Hill of Slane Cruachain Brí Éle (Table 1; Fig. 1: 40; Fig. 7) in (Fig. 2). A corruption of the Irish Carraig an north County Offaly, with its large summit Disírt, ‘rock of the desert or wilderness’, mound or cairn that features in The Boyhood Carrickdexter is a hill of andesite lava and Deeds of Finn, shares both topographic and basalt that has, lamentably, been quarried out. lithological similarities with those three sites.

6

Seafin, County Armagh (Table 1; Fig. 1: 1), 1932; Grogan & Kilfeather 1997, p. 5), and Céis although granite, is located in the Ring of Corann which, at 360 metres above sea level, Gullion, a landscape of volcanic and intrusive is the highest positioned cairn in the igneous rocks exhibiting an atypical ‘ring- Carrowkeel-Keshcorann passage tomb shaped’ series of hills, with Gullion at the core. cemetery of the Bricklieve Mountains, County Sligo. The cairn is contrived as Finn’s hunting SUIDHE FINN ARCHAEOLOGY mound in the late medieval tale Bruidhen Cairns, mounds and barrows, imagined as Chéise in Chorainn, The Enchanted Cave of portals to the Otherworld and seats from Keshcorran (O’Grady 1892, i, p. 306). which Finn observed the hunt, are found in The much reduced cairn of Suidhe Finn twenty-one (56 per cent) of the thirty-seven on the summit of Mount Garret, at recorded Suidhe Finn place-name locations in Clomantagh, c. 350 metres above sea level, in Ireland (Fig. 1). The rest are associated with a the north-west of County Kilkenny, contains a possible cairn site (Fig. 2:12), a standing stone megalithic chamber, and a Bronze Age cist (Table 1: 9), an enclosure (Table 1: 33), twelve grave was recorded c. 2 metres south of the featureless hill or mountain summits (Table 1: cairn (Waddell 1990, p. 101). The summit of 4, 5, 11, 13, 23-6, 31, 34-5, 37) and a lake the hill is enclosed by a hillfort covering an (Table 1: 10). Among the five sites that present area of 3.25 ha, a strategic location that must similar profiles to the main group, there are have constituted an important boundary in the two definite cairns (39, 42), Carn an Fhéinneda remote past, as it overlooks the western (cairn of the fían) situated on the summit of approach to the valley of the River Nore Shelmartin Hill at Howth, County Dublin, the (O’Brien & O’Driscoll 2017, pp. 433, 459). The dramatically situated Céis Corann, County cairn was excavated by Graves in 1851, at Sligo, and the well preserved Cruachain Brí Éle which time he recorded the name of the on Croghan Hill (Fig. 7). The latter is an almost monument as ‘See Fionn (Suidhe Fionn)’, and circular mound of earth and stone, c. 23 noted that it was ‘traditionally said to have metres in diameter at its base and 4 metres been a great place of assembly and conference high. It is surrounded by an external berm and in the old times’ (1851, p. 290). The lies within a larger outer enclosure. The size application of the name Suidhe Finn to the and setting of the monument suggests that it cairn was recorded as early as 1800 by Tighe may in fact be a Neolithic cairn enclosing a who, in his statistical account of County passage tomb. Of the remaining two sites (38, Kilkenny, remarked that ‘in Irish this is called, 41), the footprint of what appears to have like other heaps, See Fin or Sith Fin [Suidhe been a small cairn has been recorded at site Finn+’ (1802, p. 623). 38, Knockfin on Gorumna Island in south Smaller but no less well-appointed Connemara, and there is a cairn in the cairns include Carn Seefin on Keeraunageeragh townland of Ferta (from fert meaning grave or Mountain in Connemara, and Seefin on ancestral burial) on Mangerton Mountain, Sheepshead peninsula, County Cork (Table 1; albeit at a distance south of site 41, Ros in Fig. 1: 36, 42, 18, 14, 6), both of which lie in Fhéinneda (headland of the fían) on Lough mineral-rich landscapes. Carn Seefin at 307 Leane, Killarney. metres above sea level (Fig. 4) is an oval cairn The more imposing cairns cover c. 20 metres in diameter on its long axis and 3 Neolithic passage tombs. These include Seefin metres in height. A depression in the north- at Scurlocksleap in the Wicklow Mountains, east quadrant may indicate a disturbed cist. excavated by Macalister in 1931 (Macalister The cairn is

7 constructed from predominantly local rock, especially important, and he points to the including granite, schist and marble, and examples of exploitation of iron and coal in the sandstone boulders sourced from the north Forest of Dean, silver at Goslar palace in side of Lough Corrib. Carn Seefin was an Germany and iron in the Ardennes. The important landmark on the early medieval identity and use of deer parks in Anglo- political boundary between the trícha cét Norman Ireland as places where a wide range kingdom of Gnó Mór to which it belonged, and of resources, including pasture, timber and the neighbouring local kingdoms. It endured as turf, were concentrated is well understood a boundary landmark for the later medieval Ó (Beglane 2015, pp. 73–89), but exactly where Flaithbheartaigh lordship of Iarchonnacht. in early medieval Gaelic kingdoms and later Some monuments with the medieval lordships such resources were designation Suidhe Finn are now quite accessed has not been tackled. At least half of degraded, such as Knockseefin, County the boundary places indicated by Suidhe Finn Limerick (Fig. 8), so that it is difficult to tell landmarks can be confidently described as from surface remains whether the monument landscapes of enriched natural resources in was a cairn or earthen mound. In other cases their historical contexts. They were locations cropmarks and place-names are the only where useful earth materials were available. If indicators of former hilltop cairns and mounds. the place-name Suidhe Finn is taken as The footprint of a cairn can be discerned at indicative of real hunting grounds, and not just Seafin, County Armagh (Table 1; Fig. 1), a low as an index of the survival of Finn lore, then all hill quarried for granite in recent years, in the forty-two sites can be considered as dramatic setting of the volcanic Ring of environments that once supported hunted Gullion. The former presence of a boundary species. The Finn Cycle of tales alludes to grave marked by a cairn is intimated in the hunting in the landscapes of some of the more field name Lough Carnaman, ‘the cairn of the well-known seats of Finn, such as Cenn Abhrat women’ east of Seefin, County Cavan (Table 1; or Seefin Mountain (Fig. 1: 20) in the Fig. 1: 2) suggesting a fert or ancestral burial Ballyhoura Hills, Suidhe Finn at Slievenaman place there. Such graves often involved the (Fig. 1: 27) in County Tipperary, Seefin insertion of female burials into existing Mountain in Sliabh Cua (Fig. 1: 32) County prehistoric funerary monuments in the period Waterford, Carn an Fhéinneda (Fig. 1: 39) on 400–700 A.D. They were used as territorial Howth headland, and Céis Corann (Fig. 1: 42) boundary markers and cited in the legal in the Bricklieve Mountains. The thirteenth- procedure of taking possession of land and century Colloquy of the Ancients directly invoked during disputes over land (O’Brien & associates Suidhe Finn with the choicest Bhreathnach 2011, pp. 53–5). hunting ground of Finn and the fían on the summit of ‘Sliab Formaile’ (‘very bare mountain’), alias ‘Breicsliab’ (‘speckled mountain’), in upper Connacht (Dooley & Roe FINN’S SEAT AND NATURAL RESOURCES 1999, pp. 183–5). In the tale Bruidhen chéise in Royal control of resources associated with Chorainn, Finn and his fían set out hunting on forests in liminal places of European kingdoms the borders of the upper Connacht kingdom of has been noted by Rollason (2016, pp. 147– Corran. To observe the dogs coursing the hill, 50). Resources included everything the forest Finn sits on his hunting mound (dumha selga) could provide, from pasture to timber, honey on the top of Céis Corann (O’Grady 1892, i, p. and minerals. The extraction of minerals was 306). The term dumha selga, used of a hunting

8 platform in literary and historical sources, is Finn settings may indicate an adaptation of attributed a curious hybrid identity in earlier hunting environments. Carrickdexter fíanaigecht, often presented as a burial mound and its adjoining townland of Pighill (Suide Find and Otherworld entrance as well as the focus of the Boyne valley) contained a deer park in of an assembly or inauguration (FitzPatrick the nineteenth century, as did Knockseefin at 2013, pp. 115–6). Pallasgrean (Fig. 8) and Croghan Hill in County It may seem sensible to dismiss the Offaly. hunting places of fíanaigecht as fictive, literary Hunting was the predominant land use landscapes, but their role as real hunting in frontiers between territories and in liminal preserves in Gaelic polities can be areas between wild and cultivated land in corroborated to a degree. For instance, the Euopean kingdoms (Rollason 2016, pp. 140–2; landscape of Seefin Mountain in Sliabh Cua, Pluskowski 2006, p. 59) and there is no reason celebrated in the Colloquy of the Ancients as to believe that hunting practices among Gaelic one of Finn’s hunting preserves (O’Grady elites in medieval Ireland departed from that 1892, ii, p. 138), was a forest and royal norm, Predation on the borders of territory in demesne of the English kings Henry III and medieval Ireland may have been related to Edward I, set aside for their hunting in Ireland maintaining key boundary places and it is in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries possible that linear earthworks of varying (Sweetman 1875, p. 458; 1886, p. 114). That lengths in some of these landscapes (Table 1: role for Sliabh Cua is likely to have originated 1, 8, 17, 23, 27) might have been reused in with the early medieval kings of Déisi Muman. medieval ritual coursing of deer and boar/wild It was on the border of their territory where it pig on boundaries. met the kingdom of Eóganacht Caisil. A cairn In Ireland 47.6 per cent of Suidhe Finn at Poul-na-maddra-ruadh (hole of the red sites occur in close proximity (250 metres–5 dogs) on Seefin Mountain, which sits in an km) to documented metal ore localities, many extensive Bronze Age ritual and settlement of which have been worked in recent history landscape (Moore 1995), was a boundary (Fig. 9). The bedrock of Cenn Abhrat or Seefin landmark and probably a hunting seat of the Mountain in the Ballyhoura Hills is kings of Déisi Muman. conglomerate and purple sandstone which Further confirmation of the reality hosts a bed of iron ore c. 250 metres east of behind Finn’s hunting grounds is provided by the summit (Fig. 3). The volcanic Knockseefin dog, pig and deer-related place-names. The at Pallasgrean lies in an area rich in iron, zinc, first Ordnance Survey also recorded for Sliabh malachite and quarried limestone, dolomite Cua the names ‘Dog’s Gap’, and and sandstone (Fig. 8), and gold has been ‘Harnanmaddra Gap’, which may refer to a recorded in the foothills of Slievenaman, former coursing or ambush location. Seefin in County Tipperary, the summit of which hosts a Nagles Mountain, County Cork, contains a mound variously known as Suidhe Finn and Síd natural pool called ‘Poulawaddra’ (‘hole of the na mBan Finn — ‘otherworld mound of the dog’) with a ring-barrow adjacent to it, and white women’ (Fig. 1: 27). Carn Seefin in immediately east of Knockfin on Gorumna Connemara (Fig. 4) lies in a contact zone Island in Connemara, the townland name between Ordovician granite and older Teeranea ‘land of the deer’, recorded as early Dalradian metamorphic rocks that host copper as 1585, suggests a red deer population on the and gold pyrite, chalcopyrite, sulphur and lead, island in the past (Freeman 1936, pp. 52, 55). among a range of other minerals, all of which The presence of modern deer parks in Suidhe has been mined in the modern period. The

9 majority of the copper mine sites occur to the PLACES OF CONFLICT north, north-east and east of Carn Seefin. The It has long been established that battles and lowland skirt of the mountain, and the military musters were convened in particular mountain itself with its summit cairn, are early medieval boundary zones (Ó Riain 1974), home to some of the largest red deer in Britain but despite that important observation there and Ireland. The animals appear to seasonally has been remarkably little application of it in migrate there to avail of the abundance of Irish landscape studies. The in-between world mineral licks. of boundary zones were ideal performative Evidence for early medieval spaces for aggressive displays of power (Mac exploitation of ores and stone at boundary Shamhráin 1996). The Irish chronicles contain locations with Finn-related place-names or regular if fleeting references to early medieval attached Finn lore is, as yet, uncorroborated to conflicts in territorial boundaries of client any great degree. However, one outstanding kingdoms and their overkingdoms. In A.D. 593 example that encourages an a priori case for and 1031, two battles were fought between seeking field evidence of medieval opencast the Munster dynasties of Déisi Muman and mining and metallurgy, as well as quarrying for Eóganacht Caisil, in the Sliabh Cua mountain building stone, in boundary landscapes with range which, as already seen, constituted a Finn associations, is the layering of tales of limen between the territories of the two rival Finn onto an early mining landscape at Lough dynasties (O’Donovan 1856, pp. 219, 823; Fig. Leane, County Kerry. Lough Leane was on 1). Cenn Abhrat or Seefin Mountain in Fonn royal land of the early medieval Munster Timchill (Fig. 3), the boundary land that acted kingdom of Eóganacht Locha Léin (Fig. 1). as a buffer between the rival overkingdoms of Excavations on Ross Island (Ros in Fhéinneda), Tuadmuma and Desmuma, was the site of a a headland running westward into Lough battle in 757 (Mac Airt & Mac Niocaill 1983, Leane from the east shore, revealed Bronze pp. 210, 211). The reasons for persistent Age copper mines and, crucially for this conflict there, between two major Munster argument, evidence of early medieval copper overkingdoms, are unclear, but it may have smelting at five locations, the majority of been related to the mineral wealth of the which were radiocarbon dated to the eight neighbouring local kingdom of Fir Maige century (O’Brien 2004, pp. 405–6). It has been Méne, the name of which the twelfth-century suggested that the Eóganacht Locha Léin Irish tale, Forbus Droma Damhghaire, dynasty may have controlled this important attributes to the ‘quantity of minerals in the resource and metalwork production on Ross mountains surrounding it’ and ‘mineral stones Island (Comber 2004, p. 449). Ross Island and … in every field to this day’ (Bhreathnach 2008, Lough Leane both feature in the Finn Cycle of p. 583; Sjoestedt 1926–7, p. 66). Seefin Tales, with the former described in the Mountain was contested throughout much of Colloquy of the Ancients as situated ‘on the early medieval period, a boundary dispute swelling Loch Léin’s edge’ (O’Grady 1892, ii, p. that was inherited by the Anglo-Norman 114). Lough Leane is where Finn goes to hunt settlers of that region from the late twelfth for the king of Bantry in the twelfth-century century and persisted into the seventeenth text The Boyhood Deeds of Finn (Nagy 1985, p. century (MacCotter 2008, pp. 269–71). As late 212) and it is also the subject of a late as the mid-seventeenth century the Down medieval lay in which Finn and his fían hunt a Survey parish map for this area referred to the wild pig around the lake (Murphy 1933, ii. unprofitable Seefin Mountain as disputed land 184–5).

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‘in controversie betweene ye Countys of Corke royal land and perhaps best termed a forest. It and Limerick’. It records ‘A hill on the top of a was particularly important at provincial level Mountaine’ which is a reference to the cairn too, and it can be argued that it was also set on the summit (Petty 1655–58). The Down aside for the use of the kings of the province Survey ordinarily does not show antiquities of Leinster (Fig. 11). In that context, local client other than ruined churches, castles and kingdom boundaries may have been quite houses. The cairn must therefore have been permeable and transgressed in order to meet deemed a significant boundary indicator in the the needs of the highest-ranking royalty in uplands between the two counties in the respect of food production and natural seventeenth century, perhaps echoing the resources, as well as facilitating royal hunting, earlier importance of this place as a major battle and assembly. The origins of such an medieval boundary. arrangement are believed to lie in a process A case study of the landscape of the whereby some subordinate kings conceded hill of Almhain and its summit mound of what is termed mruig ríg, ‘king’s land’, to the Suidhe Finn in the northern confines of the king of the province within their client province of Leinster is now presented in order kingdoms in order to gain the right to contend to bring together some of the key attributes of for the provincial kingship (Charles-Edwards a threshold topography in a royal march (Figs 3 2009, pp. 73–4; Mac Eoin 1999, p. 169). It and 4). should be noted too that mruig has a more particular reading as a march (Quin 1990, p. FINN’S SEAT AND THE BOUNDARY LANDSCAPE 469) and, therefore, mruig ríg could mean a OF ALMHAIN royal forest on a kingdom boundary. Almhain (Old Irish Almu) was the legendary Following Newman’s (2005, p. 361) abode of Finn mac Cumaill and a historically and Bhreathnach’s (2005, pp. 415, 422) important threshold place of northern Leinster rationale for the demarcation of early and of its constituent regional Gaelic and later medieval estates and local kingdoms by ‘geo- Anglo-Norman territories (Figs 10 and 11). It physical characteristics’, the Almhain had an important symbolic role for the early landscape, as used by the kings of Leinster for medieval kings of Leinster, some of whom their power displays, is likely to have been were attributed sobriquets that associated framed by key topographical markers that them with the hill — such as Braen of Carman, include the hill and bog of Almhain, the holly described under the year 942 A.D. as ‘The wood of Feighcullen (Fidh Chuilinn), the Chair golden Rock of Almhain’ (O’Donovan 1856, ii., of Kildare Hills, Pollardstown Fen and the p. 653). Curragh Plain (Fig. 12) lying between the Recent work on reconstructing early neighbouring client Leinster kingdoms of Uí medieval territorial frameworks for power Fáeláin and Uí Failge. Within that frame, the structures in this region of Ireland has hill of Almhain is the dominant topographical suggested that the hill of Almhain gave its feature drawing the eye, a prospect that is name to a royal estate of the client Leinster especially numinous when looking towards kingdom of Uí Fáeláin where the ‘resident kin- Almhain from Pollardstown Fen (Fig. 10). It is group had obligations to maintain the territory in just this kind of in-between place that the as a neutral place of public assembly, questing border-hero, Finn mac Cumaill, who commercial intercourse and, perhaps mensal works for the king of Ireland, is found in the income’ for the kings of Uí Fáeláin (MacCotter tales (Miller 2000, pp. 147–50). 2016, p. 64). In other words, Almhain was

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Leinster, the historic province to which hills rising up out of a fertile island of Magh Almhain belonged was, at once, a mosaic of Life, the great Liffey Plain that stretches constituent client kingdoms and a eastwards across County Kildare (Figs 10 and geographically cohesive territory focused on 12). In the medieval past, Almhain and its the rivers Liffey, Barrow and Slaney (Fig. 11). island skirt was almost entirely surrounded by From the eight to the eleventh century the a vast area of bog and woodland extending kingship of the province was dominated by the into the Irish midlands (Smyth 1982, pp. 3, 48, Uí Dúnlainge of northern Leinster who were a 153). The immediate hinterland incorporated federation of three Leinster dynasties — Uí the renowned early medieval church of St Fáeláin, Uí Muiredaig and Uí Dúnchada from Brigit to the south at Kildare and, extending whom all the kings of Leinster were drawn in east and south-east of there, the impressive that period (Bhreathnach 2014, p. 97). By the prehistoric landscape of the Curragh Plain, end of the first quarter of the eight century with its complex of barrows and linear the Uí Fáeláin became dominant (d. 738 A.D.) earthworks, which may have been the locus of (Ó Corráin 1972, p. 26). Almhain and the Chair the early medieval royal assembly of Óenach of Kildare range, as well as the holly wood, Life (Ó Murchadha 2002, pp. 65–6). constituted a boundary zone between their The entire centre and north-west edge kingdom and the neighbouring local kingdom of Almhain has been quarried out for andesite of Uí Failge (Figs 11 and 12). While Uí Failge and the remaining south-east portion of the was a Leinster territory and its rulers claimed summit, and the rim of the hill extending from ‘a remote common ancestry’ with the Uí north clockwise to west, has been planted with Dúnlainge, the latter were adversarial towards commercial forestry. In Irish medieval texts, it them from the second half of the eight century is ascribed various names that convey a sense (ibid., p. 27). The landscape of Almhain was of its topography, perceived resources and therefore an important threshold with Uí setting. A twelfth-century topographical poem Failge to the west for the Uí Dúnlainge group ‘Almu I’ (Gwynn 1906, ii, p. 73) and a of Leinster kings and with the powerful Uí Néill contemporary prose text The Cause of the overkingdoms of Mide and Brega to the north Battle of Cnucha (Fotha Catha Cnucha) (Fig. 11) who contested the suzerainty of all fancifully attribute the naming of the hill to Leinster between the sixth century and the Núadu, a famous druid in the service of Cathair end of the tenth century (Mac Shamhráin king of Tara who, honouring the request of his 1996). The role and memory of the Almhain wife Almu, called the hill after her. In this landscape as a limen between local kingdoms origin tale, Núadu builds a fort on the hill and endured through subsequent Anglo-Norman applies alum to it so that it becomes pure colonisation. As late as the seventeenth white — ‘as if it had taken *all+ the chalk of century, the O Byrne Gaelic family of Wicklow, Ireland [to whiten it]. It is after the alum which who were tenacious of their Uí Fáeláin origins, he brought to the house that Almu is named’ had their court poets resurrect the title ‘king (Best & Bergin 1929, 3143–9; Nagy 1985, pp. of Uí Fáeláin’ and connect them with Almhain 218–9). in poems of the period 1550 to 1630 (Mac Airt The thirteenth-century Colloquy of the 1944, pp. 35, 47, 247). Ancients alludes to Carraig Almhaine, the rock of Almhain, capturing its outcropping TOPOGRAPHY AND TOPONOMY character (O’Grady 1892, ii. 256), a quality The low-lying volcanic hill of Almhain is part of observed by Lewis (1860, ii. p. 83) who a range of north-east–south-west trending described Almhain as ‘one great body of

12 granular and compact greenstone and m O.D.). On their route south-west, the Chair greenstone porphyry’. The seventeenth- of Kildare Hills include Grange Hill (226 m O.D), century Down Survey recorded it as ‘ye hill of Dunmurry Hill which is the highest point in this Carrick’ and the place-name survives in the range at 234 m O.D., with Red Hills (140 m townland name, ‘Carrick’, in which Almhain O.D.) marking the end of the range just north lies. In the Colloquy of the Ancients, Almhain is of Kildare town (Figs 12 and 13). The integrity also referred to as Tulach na Faircsena, ‘the of Almhain to this modest upland is especially look-out hill’, implying that before it became seen in the volcanic lithologies of the range Finn’s residence it was a strategic vantage which are atypical in the otherwise limestone point for observing movement in the bedrock of the plain-lands (Fig. 13). surrounding countryside (O’Grady 1892, ii., p. Significantly, the earth material resources of 131). The prospect from the summit of the region are also concentrated there, an Almhain is expansive, taking in the nearby important factor in the consideration of Curragh Plain to the south, Croghan Hill, its Almhain as royal land. volcanic counterpart to the northwest, and to the east, the Dublin and Wicklow Mountains. The place-names Druim Almhaine, the ridge of BEDROCK GEOLOGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES Almhain, and Móin Almhaine, the bog, moor or Almhain is situated within a narrow, 10 km- waste of Almhain are also applied to the long, north-east-trending outcrop of Almhain landscape in fíanaigecht, in Ordovician and Silurian rocks, known as the connection with the tale of Lurgan, a grey, Kildare Inlier (Fig. 13). It is an island of Lower one-eyed pig that haunted Almhain and when Palaeozoic rocks, surrounded by younger hunted by the hound, Gabhran, dived Upper Palaeozoic rocks (Devonian to underground in the surrounding bog (O’Grady Carboniferous age). Almhain and Grange Hill 1892, ii, pp. 486–7, 534; Gwynn 1913, iii, pp. are primarily formed of volcanics known as the 158–9). Allen Andesite Formation, which contain Although Almhain was islanded by the amygdales — vesicles of gas that are trapped Bog of Allen, to the extent that it was within cooling volcanic rock and later filled by romantically referred to as the ‘Isle of Allen’ by secondary minerals (McConnell et al. 1994). the often fantastic topographer, Beauford Similar amygdaloidal features are found in the (1786, p. 362; Smyth 1982, p. 48), it is rocks at Knockseefin on the Carboniferous nonetheless an integral part of the only volcanic hill at Pallasgrean (Fig. 8). significant high ground in the plain-lands of The Kildare inlier is host to a variety of County Kildare, two-thirds of which is rock types of considerably different ages, otherwise less than 100 metres above sea within a small area range of around 15 km2. level. For that reason the hill of Almhain The diverse assemblage of igneous rocks should be viewed in the context of the entire includes tuffs, basalts, andesites and blocky range (Figs 12 and 13) and not solely as a breccias (Fig. 13). Sedimentary rocks range separate islanded locus as it has generally from fine shales and siltstones through to been portrayed. Extending between Kilmeague sandstones and conglomerates. A major north- and the town of Kildare, a distance of c. 12 km, east–south-west trending fault runs alongside the upland comprises Almhain at 202 m O.D. the inlier, with several other faults traversing it and the range of hills known collectively as the in a north-west–south-east direction. Chair of Kildare Hills, from which it is Archaeological excavation results, separated by a 3 km skirt of lower ground (92 historical and literary sources, and

13 contemporary geological knowledge thence is Almu named’ (Gwynn 1906, ii. 72, collectively indicate that the landscape of 73). Almhain was a focus of resource potential, In constructing a profile of the mineral where a range of materials, from alum, copper and metal resources of the hill of Almhain and and iron, to ochre, building stone and the Chair of Kildare Hills, the records of conglomerates used for millstones, were antiquaries of the eighteenth and nineteenth available in the past. Two major zinc deposits centuries are important. Seward and Lewis occur in townlands situated within a distance refer to the discovery in 1786 of copper at of 4 km of Almhain: Harberton Bridge, near Dunmurry Hill (Fig. 13) including indications of Allenwood, and Bostoncommon, just west of it at Almhain. Seward (1811) noted that the the hill (McConnell et al. 1994). Present principal bed of the mine seemed to ‘lie deep evidence for the exploitation of any of those within the hill, and even to dip under the resources before the eighteenth century is valley which separates Dun Murry from the hill tentative and circumstantial, but sets a useful of Allen’. Lewis (1837, ii. 83) added that the agenda for future fieldwork in the Almhain ‘masses of sulphuret of copper’ found in 1786 landscape. was ‘of nearly 40 percent purity’ and ‘in the It has already been observed that two veins of the rocks and in the matrix of the ore, twelfth-century literary texts attribute the were quantities of the yellow ochre proper for origin of the name of the hill of Almhain to painting’. Furthermore, he observed that alum (Nagy 1985, pp. 218–19). Alum is found Almhain presented ‘indications of copper’. naturally in small quantities as the crystalline In the same account, Lewis (1837, ii. p. substance, potassium aluminium sulphate. 83) noted the exploitation, for millstones, of Usually sourced from volcanic rock, it is found red sandstone conglomerate available at the in abundance in andesite (Gómez-Tuena, northern foot of Red Hills (Fig. 13). This record Straub & Zellmer 2014, p. 1). Andesite lava is of the use of local red sandstone the bedrock of Almhain itself and a band of it conglomerate for manufacturing millstones is also occurs on the north-west side of Grange of interest in view of an early medieval Hill in the Chair of Kildare range of hills account of quarrying and moving a large trending south-west of Almhain (McConnell et millstone from a ‘mountain’, in Vita Brigitae, al. 1994). An understanding of the properties written in the seventh century by Cogitosus. and applications of alum were set out as early Although Kildare is not mentioned at all in the as the eighth century by Arabian alchemists, Vita, there is reasonable certainty that and its use was widespread in the medieval Cogitosus was ‘a religious of the Brigitine European mainland (Singer 1948, pp. 48–53). monastery of Kildare’ (Connolly & Picard 1987, A colourless crystalline substance, its purity p. 5) and, therefore, that the landscape of the was highly valued in the past as a mordant for Vita is set in the Kildare area. The longest dyeing. It was used to fix dyes on fabrics and section of the Vita concerns the making of a to soften and tan leather. Its pure white millstone and its transportation to the mill, quality is referenced in the twelfth-century which is regarded as an accurate historical topographical poem ‘Almu I’ in which the account of the manufacture of a millstone, and druid, Núadu, having built a fort on the hill, ‘by its mill-site context, in seventh-century Ireland him alum was rubbed on the rock over the (ibid., p. 6). However, the place-name of the whole fort, after it was marked out. … all white ‘mountain’ where the stone was quarried is is the fort as if it had received the lime of all not provided in the text. In early medieval Erin, from the alum he put on his house, Ireland and continuing into the later medieval

14 period, Gaelic society tended to exploit landscape is unknown, but there is sandstone and sometimes granite for archaeological evidence for pre-modern millstones, but sandstone was the more metal-working that may have used local efficient for grinding grain (Rynne 2017, p. 50). resources on the southern slope of Boston Hill, It has been suggested with reference to the a low hill of nodular shale and limestone, in millstone miracle in Vita Brigitae that the the townland of Drinnanstown South, which Kildare area would have provided red lies 1.5 km north-west of Grange Hill and c. 4 sandstone for millstone manufacture (Rynne km west of Almhain (Fig. 12). The scale of that 2017, 51; Connolly & Picard 1987, p. 6). The evidence suggests that local resources must hills of Kilmeague and Almhain and the full have been used. Geologically different from range of the Chair of Kildare hills contain Old the hill of Almhain and the Chair of Kildare Hills Red sandstone defined as red conglomerate range, Boston Hill is an outlier to the former. sandstone and mudstone (Fig. 13), with Monitoring of an area 0.5 km2 in extent Silurian sandstone on the summits of revealed pits that had been subjected to firing Dunmurry and Red Hills. That area is therefore and contained charcoal-rich soil and both iron likely to have been the historical upland source and copper slag (Elliott 2001). These were of millstones quarried for St Brigit’s monastery especially concentrated in an arc on the south- at Kildare. Baug’s (2016) research on the mica- east downslope of the hill and it was proposed schist quernstone and millstone production that the remains were indicative of a full suite quarries of Hyllestad in western Norway, of metal-working activity, namely charcoal- which were worked from at least as early as burning pits, pit furnaces and smelting the eleventh century and probably as early as furnaces (Elliott 2001). Subsequent excavation the eighth and ninth centuries, identifies of six pits, and postholes representing some archaeological indicators of quernstone and type of hut site or shelter in this metal-working millstone quarrying which might be usefully complex, confirmed their charcoal and applied to searching out any surviving remains charcoal-rich soil content, with one of the of early quarry sites in the range of hills north excavated pits containing ferrous slag (Ó of St Brigit’s monastery at Kildare. At Hyllestad, Maoldúin 2002). No dating evidence was Baug (2016, p. 25) determined that quarries determined from any of those investigations, were both shallow, whereby the rock for but during field-walking in the vicinity of the querns and millstones was exploited one layer hut site, an Early Bronze Age flint arrowhead at a time, leaving circular forms in the rock and other flint fragments, as well as part of a surface, and deep, whereby the artefacts were medieval spindle whorl, were recovered. Since quarried in columns, one beneath the other, ferrous metal-working techniques remained leaving tall, often stepped, carved walls. Of virtually unchanged from the Iron Age to the interest too is the fact that quarries were medieval period in Ireland, the focus of metal- mostly under the control of newly established working activity west of Almhain could relate monastic estates and parish churches in to any time within the broad period from c. Norway from the twelfth century onward. The 500 B.C. to the late medieval period (Elliott value of such resources to medieval 2001), with hints of an earlier Bronze Age monasteries in Ireland, such as St Brigit’s at interest in the resources of this landscape. Kildare, has yet to become the subject of field- based archaeological investigation. The extent to which metal ores might SUIDHE FINN AND THE BOUNDARY ARCHAEOLOGY OF have been exploited in the medieval Almhain ALMHAIN

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The complex temporality of Almhain as a dreamed’ that Finn mac Cumaill’s treasure was boundary landmark is expressed in the buried in a cave on the south-eastern slope of archaeology of the hill (Fig. 12). On the the hill and that Finn’s dog, Bran, guarded it summit, a degraded and now almost (Herity 2002, p. 101). He remarked on the imperceptible grass-covered mound perches c. extensive view that the summit of the hill of 8 metres from the edge of a precipitous quarry Almhain commanded but added that it was cliff. Alluded to in the Colloquy of the Ancients ‘itself remarkable for nothing’ apart from the as ‘the beautiful síd (Otherworld mound) of mound (Fig. 14) for which he had locally Almhain’ (O’Grady 1892, ii. 225), it is c. 2.5 m obtained the name ‘Suidhe Finn or Finn’s high with basal dimensions of c. 44 m by 40 m. Chair’ (ibid., p. 97). O’Donovan was The síd mound in Irish literature is contrived as confounded that his perambulations over the an entrance to the supernatural dwelling- summit revealed nothing suggestive of a royal places of the immortal beings of Irish myth in seat. During the period that he was reporting an Otherworld often described as a wondrous on Almhain, it was believed by Irish scholars place where ‘the soil is made of gems, the that Finn was an historical figure, hence houses are of gold and silver and bronze, the O’Donovan’s expectation that some kind of trees of purple glass’ (Carey 1990, p. 31; Ó elite residence, and not a funerary mound, Cathasaigh 1978, pp. 137–55). associated with Finn might have survived on Suidhe Finn on Almhain has been the hilltop. He made a sketch of the hill and its treated with ignominy in the modern period, mound of Suidhe Finn in relation to St Brigit’s with a folly known as the Allen Tower erected church at Kildare, the monuments on the at its centre in 1859 and a major quarry Curragh Plain and the pre-Christian cult site of opened there in 1952 and still worked. A cist Dún Áilinne (Fig. 14), showing an inclination on grave was allegedly discovered within the his part to relate those landmarks to each mound by workmen digging foundations for other in the historical boundary zone between the folly (Herity 2002, p. 97; Shiel-O’Grady the Leinster kingdoms of Uí Faeláin, Uí Failge 1903–5, p. 455). No scientific record of the and Uí Muiredaig. The northern bounds of the find was made, but there is a second-hand local kingdom of Uí Muiredaig with Uí Faeláin description of what was recovered. The was, after all, ill-defined before the twelfth mound was filled with soft clay and when the century (Gleeson & Ó Carragáin 2016, p. 77). masons reached the bedrock they ‘came upon Across the full range of the Chair of a number of human bones, each measuring Kildare hills there are several monuments on three feet long, and “a barrowful of small the hill summits and in the immediate bones” ’. All the bones were ‘re-interred in a lowlands around them. Most of the hollow space under a sloping tongue of rock’. monuments on the hills are prehistoric. They were attributed to ‘the giant Finn Degraded remains of two cairns and a pair of M’Coul’ (De Courcy-Wheeler 1914, pp. 411– hut sites lie within a large hill-top enclosure 13). that girdles the summit of Dunmurry Hill, while In 1837 the antiquary John O’Donovan a solitary but impressive triple-banked ring- visited Almhain during the progress of the first barrow commands Red Hills. A group of sites Ordnance Survey of County Kildare. His is the including a spring well (the ‘Earl’s well’) and a only detailed account of the archaeology of mound (Carraic an Iarla — the Earl’s Rock) on the hill before the mound was excavated and which there are the fragmentary remains of a quarrying began there. He encountered an old castle, cluster on a narrow rocky terrace in a man who ‘dreamed or pretended to have cleft between Grange Hill and Dunmurry Hill to

16 the south-west (Mac Niocaill 1992, p. 160; northern half of Ireland, was defeated and FitzGerald 1914). Local tradition connected slain in the battle by Murchad, king of Leinster, with the mound (Fig. 15) and recorded in the and how the principal saint of the province of early twentieth century relates that it was Leinster, Brigit, was invoked by the Leinster ‘where the kings of Leinster were crowned’ army to strike terror into the opposing forces and where the FitzGerald earls of Kildare were of the Uí Néill. It is her very presence that is inaugurated (FitzGerald 1914, p. 327; seen to ensure their defeat (Ó Cathasaigh FitzPatrick 2004, p. 166). The FitzGeralds of 2004, p. 45; Ó Riain 1978). Implicit in this, is Anglo-Norman origin are not known to have the role of her church in the maintenance of adopted Gaelic inauguration customs but it is the threshold lands of the king of the province possible that they used this place as a hunting of Leinster. seat or an open-air court site, perhaps The battle of A.D. 722 was between appropriating earlier use of the venue by the powerful overkingdoms. Later, in A.D. 956, the rival local kingdoms of Uí Faeláin and Uí Failge. Uí Fáeláin went to battle against neighbouring A prerequisite of inauguration sites was an dynasties at Feighcullen, the ‘holly wood’ (Fig. extensive view of the host territory — the 12), situated immediately north-west of the east–west vista from Carraic an Iarla looks to foot of the hill of Almhain (O’Donovan 1856, ii. the Wicklow Mountains, south-east over the 677). This tenth-century reference to a specific Curragh Plain, west to Croghan Hill in Offaly battle site within the Almhain landscape may with Carbury Hill visible in the distant point to the general area in which the eighth- northwest corner of the county. century battle was also held. Large-scale Almhain was the setting for at least encounters, involving up to 30,000 men, as the three battles recorded in the chronicles for the battle of A.D. 722 allegedly did, are perhaps sixth, eighth and tenth century. The first of likely to have been staged somewhere in the these is known only through a fleeting great plain-lands of the district. The nature of chronicle reference for the year A.D. 531 early medieval warfare, in which an invading (O’Donovan 1856, i. 175) and was related to army entered the host’s territory and waited the Uí Néill conquest of the Central Plain of for the defending army to arrive, required the Ireland from the Leinstermen. Although events invading army to camp at some familiar of the fifth and sixth centuries are most landmark whether a road, a fording point or at unlikely to have been the subject of a monument where they could be easily contemporary record, memories of battles located. It has been argued that such places could be relayed for generations especially were used for declarations of war but not where battles resulted in a change of dynasty necessarily as battle sites (Cathers 2002, pp. or territorial boundaries (Mac Shamhráin 13–14). There is some intimation in Gaelic 1996, p. 32). The most significant of the three sources that seasonal assembly places doubled conflicts was the battle of Almhain fought in as military camps but no direct references to A.D. 722 between the troops of the Uí Néill battles in assembly landscapes. In Mesca Ulaid king of the northern half of Ireland and the (The Intoxication of the Ulstermen), a narrative forces of the king of Leinster. The chronicles from the Ulster Cycle of Tales, written for that year claimed that the Uí Néill king led sometime between c. A.D. 700 and A.D. 1000, 21,000 men against 9,000 Leinstermen the mythological Ulster hero Cú Chulainn (Radner 1978, pp. 66–7; O’Donovan 1856, i. advises his king to camp his army at an 317). The tenth-century tale Cath Almaine assembly place because it was winter and ‘this relates how Fergal, king of the Uí Néill of the rough wintry season is no season of tribal

17 assembly’ (Watson 1941, p. 15). Out of season, for the king of Ireland in marginal places of assembly places could be used for other kingdoms, may have been to designate purposes such as military encampment. Since symbolic topographies of royal power, the battle of Almhain in A.D. 722 was allegedly especially on contested boundaries between fought in December (Radner 1978, pp. 66–7; Ó territories. It is, perhaps, the case that they Cathasaigh 2004, p. 41), it is possible that an had a more ancient role in boundary formation assembly place somewhere within the Almhain and became mnemonic devices in cognitive boundary landscape was the mustering venue landscapes of the territories to which they for that battle. Almhain is attributed an belonged. As expressions of elite spatial assembly venue of its own in poetic sources, power, they were important to maintain. such as the late medieval fenian lay, ‘Caoilte’s It has been suggested that the role of sword’, which refers to Finn and his fían the hill and mountain landscapes in which gathering at ‘Áonach na hAlmhaine’ (the Suidhe Finn monuments are set was royal assembly or fair of Almhain) (Murphy 1933, ii. marchland (mruig ríg) of Gaelic elites, 128, 129). In any consideration of where the preserved for hunting and the exploitation of a battle itself took place, the great Curragh Plain range of natural resources. Conflict leading to (Fig. 12) is an obvious candidate. battle may have been an inevitable consequence of those functions. Boundary CONCLUSION: LANDMARKS OF ELITE POWER landscapes such as Cenn Abhrat or Seefin This investigation has proposed that cairns and Mountain in the Ballyhoura Hills, Suidhe Finn mounds, named Suidhe Finn in hill and at Slievenaman, Seefin Mountain in Sliabh Cua, mountain topographies, were used as Carn an Fhéinneda on Howth headland, and boundary landmarks of Gaelic kingdoms. Céis Corann in the Bricklieve Mountains, which Hitherto, they have been regarded as are profiled in fianaigecht as major hunting epiphenomenal and somewhat intangible grounds, alongside locations such as Almhain landscape features, best explained as literary and Knockseefin that had significant resource motifs or markers of the survival of Finn-lore in potential, may have been the equivalent of the the Irish medieval landscape. For sites that royal forestis elsewhere in Europe. In that have pre-modern place-name evidence and/or respect, the attested role of the hunting literary and historical references, it has been landscape of Sliabh Cua in Munster as a royal argued that the layering of the toponym, forest of English kings in Ireland, in the Suidhe Finn, onto cairns, mounds and thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, is likely to outcropping rock on heights happened from at have been a continuity from its use by the least as early as the tenth century and Gaelic kings of Déisi Muman on the border of probably long before. However, the processes their kingdom. Designated royal marchland or of naming sepulchral cairns and mounds and mruig ríg appears also to have served different their uplands after Finn may have increased in levels in the territorial matrix, with Almhain tandem with the popularity of fíanaigecht and providing for the kings of the province of the refinement of territorial boundaries, Leinster as well as the local kingdom of Uí especially the consolidation of trícha cét Faeláin. boundaries, in the eleventh and twelfth Much work remains to be done in the centuries. The intention behind imagining field to reconstruct land-use histories of the cairns and mounds as hunting seats and landscapes of Finn’s seats and to substantiate Otherworld entrances of the warrior-hunter that they reflect former biogeographies of and border hero Finn and his fían, who work hunted species in royal forests where

18 predation, quarrying and mining took place in the medieval past.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors wish to express their sincere thanks to Marie-Luise Theuerkauf, School of Celtic Studies, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, for her personal communication about the date and authorship of the poem Brug na Bóinde II, and to all of the landowners who facilitated the fieldwork for this paper. Thanks are also due to the Atlas of Finn mac Cumaill’s Places team for their support.

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Fig. 1 Distribution of Suidhe Finn place-names in Ireland in trícha cét or local kingdoms, showing associated cairns and mounds (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 2 The suggested location of the early medieval Suide Find (Finn’s Seat) in the Boyne Valley, County Meath (Ronan Hennessy).

Fig. 3 Seefin Mountain (Cenn Abhrat) in the boundary landscape of Fonn Timchill and Fir Maige Méne and their over-kingdoms of Tuadmuma and Desmuma in the province of Munster (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 4 Carn Seefin on Keeraunnageeragh Mountain, Connemara (Paul Naessens).

Fig. 5 The bedrock geology of Suidhe Finn locations (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 6 Fan-shaped outcrop of jointed basalt columns exposed at Knockseefin, County Limerick (Elizabeth FitzPatrick).

Fig. 7 The great mound of Cruachain Brí Éle on the summit of volcanic Croghan Hill in north County Offaly (Elizabeth FitzPatrick).

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Fig. 8 The volcanic geology and archaeology of Knockseefin, Pallasgrean, County Limerick (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 9 Distribution of mineral and metal ores in Suidhe Finn landscapes (Ronan Hennessy).

Fig. 10 The hill of Almhain looking north across Pollardstown Fen (Elizabeth FitzPatrick).

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Fig. 11 The province of Leinster showing the location of Almhain and its landscape setting in the context of the northern client kingdoms of the province and its neighbours A.D. c. 700-1000 (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 12 Topography of the Almhain landscape and major archaeological sites mentioned in the text (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 13 The bedrock geology and mineral ores of Almhain and the Chair of Kildare Hills (Ronan Hennessy).

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Fig. 14 John O’Donovan’s sketch of Almhain (1837), crowned with the funerary mound of Suidhe Finn, and to the south Pollardstown ráth, St Brigit’s church at Kildare, the archaeology of the Curragh Plain including the linear earthwork named the ‘race of the black pig’ and Dun Áillinne (Ordnance Survey Letters Kildare, 1837).

Fig. 15 The mound known as Carraic an Iarla – the ‘Earl’s Chair’ – with Dunmurry Hill left of picture (Elizabeth FitzPatrick).

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No. Place-Name Townland & County Trícha Cét Archaeology & Topography Earth Materials

Granite (‘stones’ recorded OS 1832-46; Seafin (OS 1832-46); Site of cairn (ARM029:006) on Carn Hill, 187.5m Seafin, Ring of Gullion, Ind Airthir quarries recorded OS 1846-62). 1 Shefein 1657 (Paterson OD. ‘Dane’s Cast’ linear earthwork Armagh Located in a landscape of volcanic and 1939, p. 228) (MacCotter, p. 240) (ARM029:014) south of hill intrusive igneous rocks

Seefin (OS); Siffin 1618 Gailenga 2 (Hardiman 1829, ii, Inq.Ult, Seefin, Cavan Ridge summit 251.5m OD Sandstone and mudstone Jac. I, p. 7) (MacCotter, pp. 203-4)

Cairn (CL002-002) on hill slope, 268.5m OD. Aghaglinny North, Crích Bóirne 3 Carnsefin (OS) Doughbranneen cairn (CL002-001), 317.3m OD, Limestone Clare (MacCotter, p. 196) on mountain summit in adjoining Murrooghkilly

Hill summit c. 213.4m OD; Wedge tomb at NE of Seefin & Ballykelly, Slieve Ua mBlait Sandstone, mudstone, iron, galena, 4 townland; standing stone in Hurdleston townland Knockaunnamoughilly (OS) Bearnagh, Clare jasper, gold (MacCotter, p. 196) to E

Seefin, Kintlea, Knockincleagh, Ceann Sleibhe and Ceann Clifden, Inchiquin, Cenél Fermaic A hill summit at 168.6m OD overlooking 5 Limestone, galena, copper, lead Nathrach Clare (MacCotter, pp. 193-4) Inchiquin Lough (Westropp 1913, pp. 100, 103)

Killeen North/South Fonn Iartharach Cairn (CO129-024) on spine of Seefin Mountain 6 Seefin (OS) Sheepshead peninsula, in Killeen North/South, west of summit, c. 306m Sandstone, mudstone, copper Cork (MacCotter, p. 153) OD

Uí Badamna Barrow (CO123-004) on hill summit, c. 158.5m 7 Maullaghseefin (OS) Monteen, Cork Sandstone, mudstone, copper (MacCotter, pp. 158-9) OD

Cairn on mountain summit 424m OD. Not Cloghvoolia South, Fir Maige /Uí Chuirb recorded by Archaeological Survey of Ireland. 8 Seefin, Leacht (OS) Knoppoge, and Carrig, Liatháin (MacCotter, pp. Another cairn (CO034-053) Sandstone, mudstone Nagles Mountain, Cork 152, 159) Seehaunnamnafinna, 408.5m, lies NE of Cloghvoolia South, in Ballydague.

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No. Place-Name Townland & County Trícha Cét Archaeology & Topography Earth Materials

Basalt located in boundary between Seefin Stone, Seefinn Hill Ballyknock, Killelagh, Fir Lí Standing stone (LDY032:069) ‘Finn McCool’s 9 Antrim basalts (east) and (OS) Derry Finger Stone’ Seefinn Hill 228m OD (MacCotter, p. 226) sandstone/schist (west).

Quartzite, schist,slate Close to Cullion/Tievemore, Fir Manach (MacCotter, p. 10 Seafin Lough (OS) Lake overlooked by Crockkinnagoe 362.5m OD boundary between limestone (east) and Donegal 243) Dalradian metamorphics (west)

Seafin (OS 1832-46), Uí Echach Cobo Hill summit 106.7m OD west of River Bann. 11 Ballyliphyn 1609, Seafin, Down Granite Ballysiffyn 1611 (Morrin (MacCotter, p. 235) Seafin Castle and several ringforts in townland 1966, pp. 395b, 189a)

Seefin Hill, Suidhe Finn, Cenél Guaire (MacCotter, 12 sixteenth century Seefin, Galway Cairn (possible) (GA104-269) 87.8m OD Limestone pp. 144-5) (O’Donovan 1843, pp. 4-6)

Limestone. Cloonruff, from the Irish Cluain Ruibh, translates as meadow of Seefin (unverified place- Tír Maine brimstone or sulphur Nearby townland 13 Cloonruff, Galway Featureless rise c. 55m OD name) (MacCotter, p. 208) of Coalpits suggests coal measures but uncorroborated by Geological Survey of Ireland.

Clann Fhergail (Delbna Cairn on mountain summit, (GA039-010) 307.3m Granite, marble, schist, copper, lead, 14 Carn Seefin (OS) Derroura, Galway Tíre dá Locha) (MacCotter, OD. iron, gold, pyrite, chalcopyrite p. 134)

Conmaicne Mara Cairn (GA009-029) on the summit of Tully Quartz, schist, slate, soapstone, 15 Lough Seefin (OS) Cloonlooaun, Galway (MacCotter, 137) Mountain 357.3 OD copper, talc

Treangarriv / Seefin is a featureless bald summit 555.4m OD. Uíbh Ráthach (MacCotter, ‘Giant's Seat' – outcropping rock SW of Seefin, 16 Seefin, ‘Giant’s Seat’ (OS) Treanmanagh/ Sandstone and mudstone 169) 381m OD, may be the feature to which Seefin Curraheen, Kerry actually applies.

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No. Place-Name Townland & County Trícha Cét Archaeology & Topography Earth Materials

Andesite lava, alum, copper, zinc, lead. Suidhe Finn (OS) Almhain, Carrick/Pluckerstown, Uí Faeláin (MacCotter, pp. Mound (KD018-021002) on hill summit, 206m Chair of Kildare Hills – sandstone, 17 Hill of Allen (Gwynn 1906, 176-7) OD conglomerate, shale, siltstone, coper, ii, p. 73) Kildare yellow ochre

Suidhe Finn (Tighe 1802, Clomantagh Áes Cinn Caille Cairn/passage tomb (KK008-124001) on 18 Limestone p. 623) (Mountgarret), Kilkenny (MacCotter, p. 182) mountain summit 351.8m OD

Lackanascarry, Uí Énna (Eóganacht Áine) 19 Knockseefin (OS) Mound (LI024-012) on hill summit 226.2m OD Basalt/andesite lava, iron, lead Limerick MacCotter, p. 190)

Seefin Mountain Fonn Timchill (MacCotter, Cairns (LI056-032001; LI056-032002) on 20 Cenn Abhrat, Sliabh Riach Glenosheen, Limerick Conglomerate, sandstone, iron, gold (OS); Gwynn 1913, iii, pp. p. 189) mountain summit 518.8m OD 226-33)

Siffine 1610 ( Griffith 1966, Conmaicne Cúile Talad Pond barrow (MA111-057) on hillslope c. 61m 21 Seefin, Mayo Limestone p. 179) (MacCotter, p. 136) OD

Cairn (MA014-002005-) Knockaghaleague, Tír Amalgado (MacCotter, Sandstone, mudstone, iron, 22 Seefin (OS) On hill at c.240.2 OD. There is another cairn Aghaleague, Mayo p. 149) (MA014-002006-) and a court tomb (MA014- chalcopyrite 002007-) on Knockaghaleague.

Suide Find (Gwynn 1906, Carrickdexter, Pighill, Brega (MacCotter, pp. 204- Quarried-out hill, 124.6m OD, in the former 23 Basalt, andesite, copper ii, pp. 24, 25) Meath 6) demesne of Slane Castle

Seefion c.1610 Éile Uí Cherbaill Featureless ridge, 85.7m OD, in area of urban 24 Siffin Wood 1638 Seefin, Birr, Offaly Lead, zinc, iron, copper (MacCotter, p. 212) housing (Malcomson 2008, p. 110)

Seefin Featureless hill 91.5m OD 6km SW of 25 Seefin Sligo Corran (MacCotter, p. 137) Sandstone, mudstone Sephen 1655 (Petty) Keshcorran (see No. 40).

Skeheenaranky, Galtee Uí Fothaid Aiched 26 Seefin (OS) Featureless, bare-topped mountain, 447.8m OD. Conglomerate, sandstone Mountains, Tipperary (MacCotter, p. 218)

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No. Place-Name Townland & County Trícha Cét Archaeology & Topography Earth Materials

Shyfyne 1654-6 Ballyknockane/Ballypat Uíbh Eóghain Fhinn Cairn (TS078-001) on N edge of summit of 27 (Simington 1931, pp. 259- rick/Shanbally Conglomerate, sandstone, gold (MacCotter, p. 218) Slievenaman 720.6m OD 60) Tipperary

Slieveardagh Hills

Caric Sulphyn 1610 Specific point may be Sliab Ardachaid 28 (Eóganacht Chaisil) Precise location unknown Sandstone, mudstone, coal (Speed 1611/12) Knocknamuck at 349 OD in Newpark (MacCotter, p. 215) townland, Tipperary

Múscraige Uí Chuirc Cairn (TS045-014) on bare-topped mountain at Conglomerate, sandstone, barytes, 29 Laghtseefin (OS) Glencarbry Tipperary (MacCotter, pp. 214-5) 434.4m OD copper

Seefinn mound c. 106m OD (TYR035:005) Telach Óc Granite, extensive area of basalt to 30 Seefinn (OS) Bancran, Tyrone Cloghfin portal tomb to NW in adjoining trícha (MacCotter, p. 224) north cét of Árd Srátha

Mag ĺtha Featureless ridge, 61m OD, west of Mourne 31 Seein (OS) Seein Tyrone Sandstone, mudstone (MacCotter, p. 228) River

Seefin and Dog’s Gap Cutteen Sliabh Cua Cairn (WA014-001) on Seefin Mountain, 725.5m 32 (OS); Sliabh Cua (O’Grady North/Coumaraglin Conglomerate, sandstone OD, at Poul-na-maddra-ruadh 1892, ii. p.138) Mountain. Waterford (MacCotter, p. 247)

Small hill crowned by traces of an enclosure Ballinlough (Lough Caílle Follamain 33 Seafin (OS) (ME015-075), 201.5m OD, overlooking Lough Limestone Bane) Westmeath (MacCotter, p. 203) Bane

Tír Beccon 34 Sheefin (OS) Sheefin, Westmeath Hill summit, 151.5m OD. Limestone (MacCotter, p. 202)

Probably Gibbet Hill, at Knok Swiffyn 1610 (Speed junction of townlands of Síl nÉlóthaig (MacCotter, Featureless mountain summit, 314.9m OD, on 35 Quartzite, schist, slate, pyrite 1611/12) Corragh, Graiguemore pp. 253-4) edge of forest. and Coolmela, Wexford

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No. Place-Name Townland & County Trícha Cét Archaeology & Topography Earth Materials

Shiffin alias Shifeanan Uí Dúnchada Cairn, passage tomb (WI006-003) on summit of 36 Scurlocksleap Wicklow Granite. iron 1654 (Simington 1961) (MacCotter, pp. 163-4) Seefin Mountain, 622.7m OD

Meenseefin, Fir Manach (MacCotter, p. Psammitic paragneisse, quartzite, 37 Meensheefin, Donegal Featureless bare-topped hill, 907 OD Mín Suidhe Finn (OS), 243) schist, slate Meensyfin (McCrea 1801)

Clann Fhergail (Delbna Maumeen, Gorumna Possible footprint of cairn on hill summit 49.1m Granite, basalt lavas, iron, pyrite, 38 Knockfin (OS) Tíre dá Locha) (MacCotter, Island, Galway OD fluorite p. 134)

Fine Gall (on southern Carn an Fhéinneda (cairn Shelmartin hill, Sutton boundary of early medieval Cairn (DU019-003) on summit of Shelmartin hill, 39 of the warrior band) South, Howth, Co. Sandstone, mudstone, manganese clay overkingdom of Brega) 167m OD (O’Grady 1892, ii, p. 105) Dublin (MacCotter, p. 166)

Cruachain Br Éle (Nagy Uí Failge (MacCotter, p. Mound (OF010-004001) on summit of Croghan Basalt, andesite lava, bog iron ore in 40 í Croghanhill, Offaly 1985) 174) hill, 234.4m OD surrounding peatlands

Headland on Lough Leane containing copper Ros in Fhéinneda Ross Island, Lough mines. A cairn (KE074-015) lies in the townland (headland of the warrior Leane, or Muckross Eóganacht Locha Léin 41 of Ferta (from fert meaning ancestral grave) on Limestone, copper band). (O’Grady 1892, ii, p. Demesne, Muckross (MacCotter, p. 160) Mangerton Mountain, south of Muckross lake but 114) lake, Kerry there is no Finn lore recorded for it

Kesh Corann, Céis Corann, Kesh Corann Drumnagranshy and Cairn, passage tomb (SL040-008----) on summit 42 Corann (MacCotter, p. 137) Limestone (O’Grady 1892, i, p. 306) Murhy, Bricklieve of Kesh Corann mountain, 362.2m OD Mountains, Sligo

Table 1. Inventory of Suidhe Finn and related sites, Ireland.

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