The Awbeg Reindeer Incision
Archived: 10 September 2026
31,816 BCE is a modern label for an uncertain Late Pleistocene interval, when Ireland experienced volatile MIS 3 climates, falling seas and expanding ice. Derryvree, County Fermanagh, preserves freshwater sediments between till layers, indicating treeless, periglacial wetland with grasses, sedges, juniper and pools. Castlepook Cave, County Cork, contains mixed, long-accumulated remains of mammoth, reindeer, giant deer and carnivores, but cannot reconstruct one contemporary fauna. A cut-marked reindeer femur may indicate brief Upper Palaeolithic human carcass processing with a stone tool. It does not prove settlement. Subsequent ice expansion reshaped landscapes and destroyed evidence, leaving Ireland a sparsely documented cold-world frontier.
