Cave, Strade, Co. Mayo
Co. Mayo |
Settlement Sites
Strade is a small townland in County Mayo best known for its ruined Franciscan friary, founded in the thirteenth century and later associated with the remarkable carved tomb of the MacJordan family.
Less well known is the fact that the area also carries a recorded cave monument, a designation that places it in a category of natural or semi-natural underground features that have, over centuries, acquired archaeological or historical significance. Caves in the Irish record range from simple solution cavities in limestone to sites of early human habitation, ritual deposit, or refuge, and their presence in the landscape is often more layered than their unassuming surface appearance suggests.
Beyond its classification and location in the townland of Strade, the specific details of this cave, its dimensions, its geology, any finds associated with it, and its precise history, remain to be fully documented in the public record. What can be said is that the broader Strade area sits within a part of Mayo shaped by glacial activity and underlain in places by rock types capable of producing cave systems. The proximity to the friary site raises questions that are genuinely unanswered: whether the cave was known to the medieval community there, whether it played any role in local folklore or land use, and what, if anything, has been found within it.