Maguirebridge’s Arctic Silts
This was Ireland before the Last Glacial Maximum, not Ireland at the maximum. The great British–Irish Ice Sheet would later expand over almost the entire island and its surrounding shelf, but reconstructions indicate a rapidly changing situation during the preceding millennia. A major synthesis of ice-sheet growth places the combined British–Irish Ice Sheet’s pronounced expansion at around 30,000 years ago, with further Irish growth by 29,000 years ago. That chronology makes it unsafe to imagine a single blanket of ice covering every part of Ireland at c. 33.8 thousand years ago. Equally, it would be wrong to picture a mild, wooded island: cold conditions, advancing glaciers and highly variable regional environments were already defining the future landscape.