46 Recent Archceological Explorations in Co. Sligo. 



used at a funeral feast. There were bones of the ox, goat, hare, 

 etc. The lecturer read a letter he had received a few days 

 previously from a man who lives in the neighbourhood of the 

 Giant's Grave. He says : — " About twenty- five years ago the 

 landlord of the place made an excavation in the Giant's Grave 

 at the western end, near to the large headstone, at a depth of 

 about eight feet or more from the surface, he found human 

 remains in a vault or crypt of uncemented stones. Several 

 people have still a recollection of this circumstance, so that it is 

 now placed beyond a doubt this structure was erected as a 

 sepulchral monument." * Nothing in the way of weapons, 

 ornaments, or cinerary urns were found in it. 



Mr. Elcock, who is an experienced archaeologist, and who 

 carefully examined this structure, arrived at the conclusion that 

 it resembled a human figure. Mr. Elcock's opinion and mine 

 were arrived at quite independently of each other. The struc- 

 ture lies almost due east and west — the head at the western end, 

 and what resembles the limbs of the figure at the eastern end. 

 The entrance to the structure is by a passage about two feet six 

 inches wide in the centre of the structure, or looking at it as a 

 likeness to a human figure, this passage is in the centre of the 

 body, at a point that would correspond to the umbilic. It has 

 three trilithons or open doorways, one between the head and 

 body of the figure, at what would correspond to the mouth, and 

 two at the extremity of the body where the passages that corres- 

 pond to the limbs commence. This is the only structure in 

 Great Britain where there are trilithons except Stonehenge. 



The lecturer next proceeded to describe the ruins of a great 

 cashel situated a little to the south of the Giant's Grave. The 

 internal diameter of this cashel is exactly 100 feet, with encir- 

 cling wall 13 feet thick, the remains of which still stand to a 

 height of from three to four feet. An immense quantity of loose 

 stones, the remains of the original structure, lie scattered around, 

 and a still larger quantity were removed some years previously, 

 for the purpose of building fences. The entrance to this cashel 



* N.B. — Since this paper was read, Colonel Wood Martin has made further exca- 

 vations, and found a great quantity of bones. 



