Provenance
Discovery: Discovered in 1896 by Edmond Barry (with Mr. John B. O’Higgins, of Boston, U.S.A. and Rev. James Greene, B.D., C.C., Dungourney) during a search for ogham stones in the area. When an examination of the stones at ‘Rathcanning fort’ failed to uncover any ogham inscription, Barry and his companions travelled to another location to continue the search. Barry (1897, 41-42) describes how many years previously ‘an underground passage, and an underground beehive-shaped chamber, were discovered a quarter of a mile south of Rathcanning fort; and some stones from them were used for building purposes at the nearest farm houses, those of Mr. John Colbert, and of his cousin’. Barry states that after examining ‘all long stones in the rampart of the fort, and in the fences from the fort’ they went ‘to the site of the underground chamber, and on to Mr. John Colbert’s farm buildings’. It is here that an ogham inscription was finally discovered on one of two ‘white-washed flags’ acting as door jambs to a ‘carhouse’ on the farm of Mr. John Colbert (Barry 1897, 42), who informed them that they had been in place there for 80 years. It was noted that both door jambs had ‘every appearance of being flags from the roof of the underground passage in the next field’. It is noteworthy that there is a local tradition of a souterrain in what appears to be the approximate location (CO066-071----), although no trace remains. Macalister (1945, 82) and O’Kelly (1945, 19), incorrectly it would seem, give the find location of this ogham stone as the souterrain (CO066-01002-) in Rathcanning fort (CO066-01001-), in which a possible ogham fragment (I-COR-029) was later found by Macalister.
Findspot: Glenaphuca (Gleann an Phúca), Co. Cork, Ireland (ITM Coordinates (approximate): 595063, 579538)
Current repository: Ireland National Museum of Ireland (inv. no. 2003:56)
Last recorded location(s): This stone is in the National Museum of Ireland. It was examined and recorded for the Ogham in 3D project in 2017.
Support
National Monuments Service SMR ID: CO066-009----
Object type: Pillar
Dimensions: H 1.68 × W 0.61 × D 0.19 m
Condition: The stone is weathered with layers having flaked away. It has also suffered from being reused at least twice: once in the construction of a souterrain and subsequently as a door jamb in a farm building, where it was whitewashed and embedded in the ground, obscuring the end of the inscription when it was in position.
Inscription
Text field: The inscription reads upwards on the dexter angle of one of the broad faces and continues across the uneven top of the stone.
Letters: Macalister (1945, 82) noted that the inscription is ‘so thickly coated with whitewash that it is impossible to determine the technique of the scoring’. The whitewash having since been removed, the strokes appear to have been pocked. They are as even and well-spaced as the rough-edged stone allows.
Edition
Ogham text: ᚔ̣ᚂᚒ̣ᚅᚐ̣ ᚋᚒᚉ[.. ? ..
Transcription: ỊLỤNẠ MUC[.. ? ..] C̣ỌỤ
Critical apparatus:
- Barry (1897, 43) read: ILUNA MUC[OI…] 2. Macalister (1945, 82) read: ELUNA MU[C … 3. O’Kelly (1945a, 22-23) read: TULENA MU[C— 4. As the various readings suggest, it is very difficult to be sure of some of the letters. There appears to be 6 short strokes/notches before the L, although the stemline is not clear. The first three are more to the left (hence the T reading, although only the first is long enough for a consonant stroke). Of the next three, the last is especially short and may just be damage (hence the rading I). Likewise, after the L, there appears to be 4 strokes but the first is not as pronounced and perhaps should not be read as a vowel notch. The final A of this name is not at all certain. 5. It is also unclear if there were once more stokes than currently survive. There is a gap (approximately 16cm) at the top of the stone, possibly due to damage, between the C (or remains of a Q) running up the edge and the last few letters running across the top.
References
- Barry 1897, 41-44
- Macalister 1945, 82, no. 79
- O’Kelly 1945, 152-153
- O’Kelly 1945, 18-23
- Power and et al. 1994, no. 4235