"Doluid dono aniar a mathair .i. Luachair Bairennach a hainm a Boirind Corcumruad di". These words, from the story of Liamun in the Dindshenchas (Stokes 1894,3212), are one of the earliest written expressions of the place we know as the Burren. For the Burren is named not from its inhabitants but from it geology. The Burren is a geologically distinctive landscape, the habitat of rich and even unique variety of flora and fauna. Yet the careful eye of the naturalist reveals the rich splendours of a delicatey balanced ecological hierarchy, from the tiniest insects to the different mammals that range through glens, over rocky hills and through the few remaining forests found there. The phrase, Boirenn in Corcumruad, suggests an unequal relationship, a reltionship of possessor and possessed; The word Burren is derived from "bhoireann", which means "a stony place". The stone in question is mainly carboniferous limestone, the porous qualities of which, brought into contact with the moulding and, later, melting Pleistocene ice-sheets, have resulted, on the surface, in the characteristic bare, fissured pavements that are such a typical feature of this weirdly beautiful landscape, while an intricate cave-system exists underground.

John Waddell tells us "the human story of the Burren may have commenced as long as Ten thousand years ago" and the impressive remains of prehistoric burial monuments like Poulnabrone and Poulawack, not to mention the extraordinary concentration of wedge shaped gallery graves, are testimony to an age and a people far removed from us not only in time but in modes of thought and behaviour The coming of Christianity brought yet another defining dimension to the Burren. Churches and monastic settlements spread across the landscape, shaping the sensibilities of the people in ways too numerous and to subtle to mention. There is no part of Ireland where rock so obviously dominates the landscape as it does in the north-west of County Clare.

This is the Barony of Burren, and the name could not be more appropriate, because boireann in Irish means a place of rocks. Here in the Burren the great slabs of rock which are almost as flat and undisturbed as they were when they were formed in the warm, shallow seas of the Carboniferous ocean 340 million years ago.

The Burren Flora. The repute of the wildflowers of the Burren is today so well established as to be almost cliche. The flowers of the Burren are not included along with Connemara, New Grange and Georgian Dublin, as part of Ireland's heritage. Man arrived in Iareland at least 9,000 years ago, However even primitive farming can have a startling impact on vegetation, especially in areas where soil nutrients are in short supply. Of the ten thousand years of the post glacial era man has farmed the Burren for perhaps five or six. The Burren Wildlife. The term "wildlife" is both hackneyed and vague in describing living organisms. The familiar frog, for instance, is known to have been introduced into this country hundreds of years ago. The pine martin, on the other hand, has doubtless survived in the Burren since before the arrival of man. The 300 million year old fauna in its diversity and concealment is a worthy metaphor for the wildlife inhabiting the Burren today. There are twenty variety of butterflies also birds, moths, bees, shrimp, ants, beetles, woodlice, myriad, dragon fly and water scorpian just to mention a few.There are considerably more mammals than there appear to be in the Burren.

The Tomb Builders. Over seventy tombs occur in the Burren over half the total from Co Clare as a whole. A few Portal Tombs and Court Tombs, as they are called, may represent the earliest monuments (from about 3,800 BC), many if not all the Wedge Tombs being somewhat later in time probably belonging to the third millenium BC. Portal Tombs usually have two imposing portals or entrance stones flanking the front of a relatively samll rectangular or sub-rectangular chamber. The capstone, which sometimes rests just on the end stone and on the portal stones, is often very large.

The striking Poulnabrone tomb was excavated by Dr. Ann Lynch of the Office of Public Works in 1986. According to her summary account they discovered the remains of between 16 and 22 adults and 6 juveniles, including a new born baby. It was estimated, on the basis of the meagre demographic data that "the majority of the adults died before reaching the age of 30 while only one lived past 40 years" The dental data indicated that these people had a coarse diet suggestive of stone-ground cereals. Studies of vertebral pathology also indicated that these individauls shared a lifestyle characterised by hard physical labour. Some of the human bones were submitted for radiocarbon dating and results suggest that burials took place there between 3,800 and 33,200 BC.

Most of the tombs in the Burren, over 90% of them, are classified as Wedge Tombs. This is the commonest type of Irish megalithic monument widely distributed in the south-west, west and north of the country.

There are a number of prehistoric burial mounds in the Burren. The large round cairns on the summit of Turlough Hill and on Slievecarran are two of the most prominent and striking sites, but there are many smaller examples as well. Dates in the Neolithic and early Bronze Age are probale, but some round mounds with enclosing circular banks could be even later. A number of small cist graves have also been recorded. Certainly one of the most impressive of these burial mounds is the cairn at Pouawack, about two miles west of Carron, which was excavatd in 1934. It produced a large number of human bones but few dateable artefacts.

There is abundant other evidence for early settlement in the Burren: enigmatic circles, hut sites and other enclosures; stone forts and the remains of ancient field systems are common. One intriguing monumnent - many examples of which are now known to date to the Bronze Age - is the so called fulacht fiadh or burnt mound. Over 300 of them have been identified. These are usually horse-shoe shaped mounds of burnt stone, often located in wet or marshy areas.