Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 265 



XL. — On the Evidences beaeing on Sen-woeship at Mount Caelan, 

 Co. Claee. By Samuel Feegeson, LL. D., Q. C, Yice-President. 



[Eead April 28, 1873.] 



In the paper on the Mount Callan Ogham Inscription, which I re- 

 cently read before the Academy, I abstained from expressing any 

 opinion on the literary forgery which O'Donovan charges Theophilus 

 O'Flanagan to have committed, in citing certain verses as from the poem 

 called The Battle of Gavra, containing an allusion to assemblies for 

 Sun-worship on Mount Callan. It was observed, in the discussion 

 which ensued, that the idea might have been suggested to 0' Flanagan 

 by a mistaken inference from the name of the adjoining locality, 

 Booleynagreana. This was a speculation on which I conceived it un- 

 necessary to enter, as I had just learned from Professor O'Looney, in 

 addition to the particulars contained in the paper, that there were 

 other facts within his personal knowledge, which, if the verses were 

 spurious, as he conceives them to be, would offer a more tangible 

 ground for accounting for their composition. I was aware that con- 

 temporaneously with the publication of O'Flanagan's paper, the author 

 of the Post- Chaise Companion had spoken of the discovery of the 

 monument ascribed to Conan, and had designated either it or the 

 mountain itself (for his language is ambiguous) by the significant name 

 of Altoir na Greine, "Altar of the Sun." Finding no allusion to an 

 altar of the sun in O'Flanagan's paper, and observing that he spoke of 

 the cromlech now called Derniod and Crania's Eed, as a Druid's altar, I 

 had concluded that that must have been the object referred to by 

 "Wilson, and dignified by admission into Cough's Camden, under the 

 name of Altoir na Greine. I was also aware that in 1814 some object, 

 designated as " The Altar of Sacrifice," had been referred to by a Mr. 

 John Kennedy, of Limerick, writing to a friend in Cork, as then 

 existing near Loch Booleynagreana, which I had taken to be the same 

 cromlech. From Professor O'Looney, however, I learned that in this 

 I had been mistaken, for that a distinct structure bearing that name, 

 and made the place of certain observances (to be noticed further on), 

 did actually exist, till within a recent period, on a part of Callan 

 Mountain called Alt na Greine, in the immediate vicinity of the 

 Bo-called stone of Conan. Conceiving that such a fact, vouched by a 

 faith worthy living witness, could not but be deemed extremely interest- 

 ing and valuable, I begged of Professor O'Looney that he would put 

 in writing the statement which he had had the goodness so to com- 

 municate to me. He has kindly complied with my request, and has 

 embodied in his detail of facts his own views as to the inferences 

 which legitimately may be drawn from them. I will not be under- 

 stood as giving my adhesion to all these opinions. I would, indeed, 

 have much preferred that Professor O'Looney should have made the 



