Derryvree’s Moss and Mammoths
Archived: 17 September 2026
Around 31,438 BCE, Ireland had no historical calendar, communities or written record; evidence instead describes a changing Late Pleistocene environment. At Derryvree, County Fermanagh, organic sediments between glacial tills indicate a locally ice-free, open tundra wetland during a broad, uncertain interval, later buried by ice. Plant and insect remains reveal cold, damp, sparsely vegetated ground. Castlepook Cave, County Cork, preserves mixed remains of mammoths, reindeer, giant deer, predators and other cold-adapted animals, demonstrating intermittent access to suitable habitats. A marked reindeer bone may indicate human butchery, but cannot establish settlement. Subsequent glaciation destroyed or obscured evidence of Ireland’s earliest visitors.