History of Inniskeen, County Monaghan

Inniskeen, as it is now called, is situated on the Monaghan /Louth border. It is mentioned in the Annals of the Four Masters - "Combustes Maeldun in Insula Caoin", a local chieftain was burned to death on the local island of Inis Caoin on the river Fane - under the date 636 AD.

           Rock Art

This territory had been inhabited for centuries before this time The Late Stone Age/Early Bronze people left us their inscriptions on large boulders of rock in nearby townlands. The Megalithic people -so called because the culture is characterised by the use of large stones - spread westward from the middle east about 3000 BC, with their farming methods and culture.

The principal relics these ancient people left with us are the huge monuments which they erected to honour their dead. One such monument overlooked over the Fane river at Inis Caoin and is now called the mound or motte. These monuments would be both focal points for the community that built them and act as signals to outsiders showing that the group had traditional rights to the land, e.g. "we can use these lands, for look here are our ancestors". A flint arrow head, was discovered in the river Fane near Inis Caoin and is now in the National Museum in Dublin, where it has been dated 2000 BC.