Excavations at Moylisha wedge tomb in Wicklow

We examine the findings of two excavations carried out at Leaba na Saidhe (Labbanasighe), also called Moylisha wedge tomb.

Leaba na Saidhe is a wedge tomb sited within a small walled enclosure in the southern corner of a field in the townland of Moylisha, Co. Wicklow. Situated on the north-facing slope of Moylisha Hill, it is overlooked by Stokeen Hill to the east on the summit of which is a circular cairn.

What is a wedge tomb?

Wedge tombs are the most common type of megalithic tomb in Ireland. They are so-called because of their distinctive wedge shape being broader and higher at the entrance and tapering in height and width to the rear. A typical wedge tomb consists of a long narrow burial chamber (or “gallery”), sometimes with a smaller chamber to the front or rear. Large roof slabs lie on top of the sidewalls, which often comprise one or more rows of outer-walling. A cairn (or mound), marked by low kerbing, usually covers the tomb.

Most wedge tombs were built in the Bronze Age about 4,000 years ago. For example, radiocarbon dates obtained from human bone in the wedge tomb at Labbacallee, Co. Cork, indicate that the monument was in use in the late third millennium BC (c.2200-2100 BC).

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Leaba na Saidhe

“On approaching it, at first sight the Leabha seems but a little rocky undulation in the soil, surmounted by a clump of heath and furze that would scarcely attract your attention in a neighbourhood of wild and rocky character.” (Canon Ffrench 1887)

Leaba na Saidhe is a roofless wedge tomb with only one displaced roofstone surviving. The tomb had a sub-rectangular cairn, measuring 13m x 10m and oriented northwest/southeast. Its main burial chamber is at the northern end; it is double-walled and measures about 6m long. It widens uncharacteristically towards the southeast. In front of the main chamber and separated by a low sill is a small antechamber (or entrance chamber), measuring 0.8m x 0.5m.

Only a small number of wedge tombs have been excavated. Unusually the wedge tomb in Moylisha has been partially excavated on two occasions: once in the late 19th century and again in the first half of the 20th century.

The first excavation

The Rev. J. F. M. Ffrench undertook a hurried dig of the main chamber one freezing cold day in 1887. Canon Ffrench made the following remark regarding the onerous task he had set himself:

“I knew there would be considerable difficulty in getting anyone to open the chamber, as the peasantry look upon it as haunted ground, and would not wish to run the risk of incurring the anger of the ‘good people’ .”

Nonetheless, with the assistance of local gentleman Thomas Swan, Esq., Canon Ffrench managed to secure the help of two local labourers.

The monument was then almost completely buried beneath the soil and partly covered by two large flagstones, while the chamber was full of soft earth and small slate stones. Despite snow and sleet storms on the day of the excavation, the small team managed to clear about three-quarters of the fill in the chamber.

“We excavated as far as under the great cap-stone, and there we were stopped by large stones that seemed to have been cap-stones broken and fallen in, and which could not be removed without great labour and difficulty. I then set the men to work above the great cap-stone … but we could make no impression the earth was so hard and full of stones imbedded in it … I regret to say we found nothing.”

The only notable discovery was “a substance like powdered white stone of some kind”. Canon Ffrench believed that it may have been decayed or burnt bones; while this remains a possibility, it could also have been powdered granite.

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According to lore, superstitious locals returned in the middle of the night to fill in what had been dug out that day so that the fairy folk would not be perturbed.

The second excavation

Although Canon Ffrench had hoped to return one day to finish the excavation of the chamber, this never came to pass. Instead Moylisha wedge tomb was excavated half a century later, in 1937, by a new team under the supervision of F.T. Riley and assisted by Gearóid Ó h-Iceadha and 15-year-old Gustav Mahr (son of the director of the National Museum and later a Nazi soldier). The dig functioned as an employment scheme operated by the Office of Public Works and National Museum.

The scrub around the tomb was cleared and almost immediately a small mound on top of the cairn was identified as the spoil heap (or dump) relating to the 1887 dig. This heap was carefully examined and revealed 25 fragments of coarse pottery sherds and about a cupful of bone fragments, all of which presumably derived from inside the main chamber. The small pottery sherds are typically undecorated and represented two different coarse wares: one reddish in colour and the other – only two of the fragments – was a black-coloured ware.

The main chamber was then excavated. A further 22 pottery sherds of the red coarse ware and more bone fragments were revealed.

A small semicircular hearth filled with charcoal and cremated bone was found at the northern end. East of the hearth a small trench adjoining the north wall was also filled with bone fragments. All of the bone fragments found during the excavation were too minute to allow any sort of detailed identification beyond their classification as human child and adult bone. Bone evidence from other excavated wedge tombs also indicates collective burial practices, with both cremated and unburnt burials recovered.

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Some small chips of burnt flint and part of a flint pebble were also found in the main chamber. In the antechamber a piece of flint was discovered in the fill and two schist discs in the wall filling.

The cairn was carefully excavated down to subsoil level which revealed an interesting arrangement of slabs laid around the tomb.

Finds within the cairn included a hammer stone, a hone (for sharpening blades) and at the base of the cairn, near the east end of the main chamber, two halves of a sandstone mould for a spearhead were found.

This mould was made for the production of a bronze looped socketed spearhead, a type which dates to the Middle Bronze Age. Gearóid Ó h-Iceadha argued that this find indicated a late date for the erection of the wedge tomb between c.2300 and 1000 BC. But the excavation evidence is not altogether clear on this point and the find should probably be attributed to later disturbance and may indicate that the tomb was used over a considerable period. The dating of this wedge tomb therefore remains debatable.

Lack of time, funding and equipment meant that the site was not fully excavated.

The placename

Locals have long maintained that “Leaba na Saidhe” (Labbanasighe) can be translated as “Bed of the Fairies”, with “sídhe” the Irish for fairy folk. It is also referred to locally as the “Queen of Leinster’s Grave”.

Others have claimed that the name can be translated as “Bed of the Bitch”, with “soith” the Irish for female dog. The 19th-century Ordnance Survey researcher and Irish-language scholar John O’Donovan explained that a famous huntsman was said to have buried his favourite female greyhound in the tomb.

However, the discovery of the spearhead mould prompted a re-evaluation of the name: Gearóid Ó h-Iceadha suggested that the “saidhe” element was a corruption of “saighead” meaning spearhead or arrow. The true meaning of the name remains a mystery.

After the excavations

After the 1937 excavation, the ground was filled in to the level of the slabs. The material from the cairn, which originally survived to a height of 1.5m, was used to build the protective wall which now surrounds the tomb.

When the excavation was undertaken in 1937, the land was in the ownership of John Nolan of Rialto, Dublin. Following the excavation, Nolan placed the monument in the guardianship of the state.

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