Derryvree’s Entombed Herbarium
Archived: 17 September 2026
Abstract
Around 31,439 BCE, a modern label within Marine Isotope Stage 3, Ireland was a changing cold-climate landscape rather than a historically documented society. Derryvree, County Fermanagh, preserves freshwater organic sediments beneath later glacial till, dated broadly to 36,900–31,700 calendar years BP. Pollen, plants and insects indicate open, wet tundra with sedges, mosses, herbs and pools. Cave faunas show reindeer, mammoth, hyaena and other cold-adapted animals reached Ireland, though deposits are mixed and imperfectly dated. A marked reindeer bone at Castlepook may suggest human butchery, but secure evidence of people is far later. Expanding ice eventually buried Derryvree’s wetland biological record.