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  • Millin Bay Cairn

    Topics:
    • Historic environment, 
    • Archaeology & Monuments

    Quintin Bay Road
    Portaferry
    BT22 1QB
    United Kingdom

    Contact

    Phone: 028 9082 3207
    Email: scmenquiries@communities-ni.gov.uk

    Additional Information

    Open to the public: Yes, entry is free (Sometimes public access is restricted due to works for example. Check before you visit)
    Grid reference: J6288449503
    View on the Historic Environment Map Viewer
    SM number: DOW 032:015
    View details on the NI Sites & Monuments Record (NISMR)

    About Millin Bay Cairn

    This complex late Neolithic burial monument appears now as an oval mound of sand, grass-grown, with a surrounding oval stone setting. Excavation in 1953 revealed a complicated sequence of structures under the mound. Earliest was a north-south stone wall, followed by a long stone cist west of the wall, with the bones of at least 15 individuals, neatly sorted and stacked. Around this and another small cist an oval of stone slabs was set, externally supported by a bank of shingle, and the oval area was filled with shingle and slabs. Outside the shingle bank seven more small cists were found, some with cremated bone, and the whole area was finally covered with the long mound of sand in the outer oval setting of stones. Many of the stones were decorated with pecked curvilinear and rectilinear motifs, suggesting some possible link with the passage tomb tradition. Gabriel Cooney points to the various ways in which human remains were treated: in the earlier phase bones were carefully sorted and stacked, while later bodies were cremated and deposited in small, individual cists. Finds were sparse but a late Neolithic date is suggested.

    Other historic places you can visit:

    • Love Heritage NI
    Millin Bay Cairn
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