BIRM-166’s Pollen Census
Archived: 17 September 2026
31,405 BCE cannot denote a precisely dated Irish event, but falls within Marine Isotope Stage 3. At Derryvree, County Fermanagh, freshwater sediments between glacial tills, dated broadly to 34,950–29,750 BCE, preserve pollen, plants, mosses and beetles from an ice-free, treeless periglacial wetland. Comparable deposits confirm episodic cold open habitats, while Crag Cave records warmer interstadials. Castlepook Cave, County Cork, yielded cold-adapted fauna and a reindeer femur possibly bearing butchery marks, suggesting, but not proving, brief human presence. Later glaciation damaged evidence. No settlements, polities, trade or sustained occupation can be demonstrated; the period is reconstructed from environmental and faunal archives.