Its name suggests that the festival of Bealtaine was celebrated here on the 1st of May. The festival marked the start of summer as it sits halfway between the spring equinox on March 21st and midsummer on June 21st.
Traditionally fires would be lit on hilltops throughout Ireland and sites like Beltany, on a hill overlooking surrounding countryside, would have had local or regional significance.
It's a site that has been disturbed, by quarrying for stone and earth in more recent centuries, and some archaeologists suggest that the stones of Beltany stone circle were originally the kerb stones for a large cairn.
