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Giants Grave is a court tomb, a Neolithic megalithic monument located in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. Court tombs are among the earliest communal burial structures in the British Isles, dating from the fourth millennium BC. These distinctive monuments feature a central open court fronted by massive stone orthostats, typically approached by a façade of large upright stones. The court provided a focal point for ritual activity and access to burial chambers, which were normally arranged in a series of compartments.
The site at Giants Grave sits upon bedrock composed of Palaeogene extrusive rocks—ancient mafic lavas and tuffs formed during intense volcanic activity millions of years after the monument's construction. This geological foundation, typical of the Antrim plateau, is locally exposed dark igneous stone that would have influenced the megaliths available to the Neolithic builders. The tomb stands within the wider landscape of megalithic monuments that characterise the Irish Neolithic, testament to the sophisticated ceremonial practices of farming communities across the Irish Sea.
The monument is protected by the Historic Environment Division of the Department for Communities under reference number 2776, recognising its archaeological importance as a surviving example of Neolithic funerary architecture. Such monuments provide crucial evidence for understanding settlement patterns, ritual practices and the spread of early farming culture across the north of Ireland during the fourth and third millennia BC.
Giants grave. court tomb is a scheduled monument protected by Department for Communities NI under reference 2776. View the official record →
Giants Grave is a court tomb, a Neolithic megalithic monument located in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It is designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument by DfC Northern Ireland (NISMR) under reference 2776.
Giants grave. court tomb dates from the neolithic period, and is classified as a megalithic tomb. It is one of over 32,000 scheduled monuments protected across the UK.
Giants grave. court tomb is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by DfC Northern Ireland (NISMR) — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in Ni. The official designation reference is 2776.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Kilmakee stone circle. cairn ('stone circle') (7.2 km), Mound - raised rath? (7.5 km), Barrow (7.9 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 14 strands of Giants grave. court tomb's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Giants grave. court tomb stands on Unnamed Extrusive Rocks, Palaeogene, bedrock that formed in the Paleogene. The rock here is mafic lava and mafic tuff.