placenamesMalin More
Málainn Mhóir
Malin More’s valley contains a concentration of prehistoric monuments, while archaeological testing has revealed older land boundaries beneath later peat.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Málainn Mhóir · Irish · main form · validated name
- Malin More · English · main form
Place & story
A valley of monuments
The Irish Quaternary Association’s southwest Donegal field guide identifies an unusual concentration of Neolithic remains in the small Malin More valley. These include portal tombs, a multiple-chamber tomb complex, court tombs and traces of fields predating the bog. The range of monuments points to a prehistoric landscape extending beyond any single tomb, although the surviving stones do not by themselves reveal the full pattern of occupation. [2]
A boundary below the peat
Testing for a proposed golf course in 2002 exposed a stone boundary beneath peat near the hotel in Malin More. Archaeologist Martin Timoney recorded a feature about 1.8 metres wide at its base and half a metre high. Too little was uncovered to determine whether it was a collapsed wall or how well it had worked as a barrier. It added to evidence for field boundaries recognised locally in 1974. [3]
A garden with successive uses
The same investigation recorded a different history for ground behind the hotel. From the mid-nineteenth century it had served as the coastguard station’s vegetable garden, and from 1932 as the hotel’s garden. Timoney found no visible trace of a recorded enclosure there; trenches for the proposed development likewise produced no significant archaeological remains. The report distinguishes the area’s rich prehistoric setting from what was actually found in particular test trenches. [3]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Donegal
- Barony
- Banagh
- Civil parish
- Glencolumbkille
- Within
- Malinbeg
- Within
- Malin More
- Coordinates
- 54.69252, -8.77549 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 1413086 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Malin More. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- IQUA Field Guide 34: Southwest Donegal, archaeology section, page 62 · Irish Quaternary Association
- Malin More: field system, excavation 2002:0429, licence 02 E 1433 · Martin A. Timoney
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2012-01-04. How this page was prepared.