Glanleam Standing Stone

It was a very quick visit to the Valentia Lighthouse. There was an interesting museum apart from the lighthouse itself which had various old lighthouse stuff like maps, radio and lamps. I got to know how lighthouses operated back then. It is still in operation but it is mostly automatic now. There is a keeper who comes once in a while to check on things. I started to make my way back to the car when I noticed something in the grass outside the lighthouse. There was a standing stone. Now this is something I never expected to see here.

The use of stone in Ireland seems to be very common. There is a large number of stone forts as well as other stone structures which show the people’s mastery of the use of stone. Stone seems to feature prominently in the culture of the people here. A very good example is this standing stone. The official name is the Glanleam Standing Stone. There is a singular standing stone here and there are smaller stones which are at the foot of the standing stone. The smaller ones are used to stabilize the larger one and prevent it from toppling down. It isn’t clear when the stone was set here but it is most certainly very old at more than two thousand years old. It is amazing to see something like this still standing after all this time. It is thought that the stone was used for astronomical observations.

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