Grianán of Aileach
Grianán Ailigh
A massive circular stone fort on the summit of Greenan Mountain, overlooking Lough Swilly and Lough Foyle.
Overview
Overview
The fort is a thick-walled stone ring with internal terraces and stairways and passages within the wall. Outside it, lower banks enclose the hilltop. What visitors see today is largely the result of a reconstruction carried out in the 1870s, which rebuilt the wall from collapsed stone.[1][2]
View on map| Monument type | Cashel |
|---|---|
| Period | Stone fort early medieval; summit enclosures possibly earlier |
| Condition | Surviving |
| Townland | — |
| County | Donegal |
| Landscape | Inishowen |
Solar & Horizon
Solar & horizon
From the air
From the air
Folklore & placenames
Folklore & placenames
Folklore / Oral tradition
The Metrical Dindshenchas contains poems on Ailech that explain its name and attribute its building to figures of legend. They belong to a learned medieval tradition of explaining famous places through stories of origin.
View full recordNearby sites
Landscape
Landscape
- Recorded site
- Lost site
- Aerial observation
- Landscape
- Folklore record
List the 3 mapped places
- Grianán of Aileach — Cashel
- Croaghan Hill — Cairn (approximate)
- Beltany Stone Circle — Stone circle
Archaeology
Archaeology
The stone fort survives in reconstructed form. Distinguishing original masonry from nineteenth-century rebuilding is a question for any interpretation of the structure.
Ailech appears in the Irish annals as a seat of the Cenél nEógain kings of the northern Uí Néill. The Annals of the Four Masters record its destruction by Muirchertach Ua Briain, king of Munster, in 1101. The identification of the Greenan Mountain fort with this Ailech is long-standing and widely accepted.[3]
Evidence
HistoricalThe Annals of the Four Masters record the destruction of Ailech by Muirchertach Ua Briain in 1101.
- Type
- Historical source — Map, antiquarian account, manuscript or historic publication.
- Recorded by
- Four Masters (17th-century compilation)
- When
- Not stated
- Source
- [3]
- Interpretation
- Annals compiled long after the event from earlier sources.
Media
Media
Sources
Sources
- [1]Historic Environment Viewer (Sites and Monuments Record). National Monuments Service, Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.Official record · Cited for: National record of the monument's classification and location.
- [2]Brian Lacy et al.. Archaeological Survey of County Donegal. Donegal County Council, 1983.Published archaeology · Cited for: County inventory description.
- [3]Ed. and trans. John O'Donovan. Annála Ríoghachta Éireann: Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters. CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts, University College Cork, 1848–51 (edition), s.a. 1101.Historical source · Cited for: Annalistic record of Ailech's destruction.
- [4]Ed. and trans. Edward Gwynn. The Metrical Dindshenchas. Todd Lecture Series. Royal Irish Academy, 1903–1935, Ailech poems.Folklore / oral tradition · Cited for: Medieval place-lore for Ailech.