Seahan is one of the four hills in the so called ‘Circuit of Kilbride’. Kilbride Rifle Range is an Army range on the Dublin/Wicklow border and it is nestled in a valley surrounded by Seahan, Corrig, Seefingan and Seefin. In fact these summits mark the boundary of the Rifle Range (Although strictly speaking the boundary passes within 150 metres of Seahan’s summit)
A minor road leads from Bohernabreena in Dublin past the entrance to the Range. Seahan can be reached from this road at O073200 A for example. At about 480 metres altitude this leaves a 160 metres climb to Seahan. There are remains of several megalithic tombs on Seahan. There are also good views towards Dublin and across to Seefingan and Seefin.
Because of the rather featureless nature of these hills it could be easy to become disoriented in poor weather which could mean an unintended descent into the Rifle Range. Seahan itself is generally ok underfoot, but the wider circuit includes some very wet and boggy cols. Also scramblers and quad bikes have churned up the bog in many places. Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/4960/

The name Seahan is said to come from ‘Suíochán’. On the Down Survey map of 1655 and on Rocque’s map of 1760, the mountain is called “Seavick na Bantree”, an anglicisation that suggests the translation ‘Seat (Suí) of the Widow’s Son’. The word “Suí” in one combination or another keeps coming up in other hilltop names in this area as well (Seefin, Seefingan), and it clearly refers in each case to the large megalithic tombs on those mountains. If we remember that the old Fenian Cycle in Irish literature situates some of the heroic feats of Finn MacCool and the Fianna in nearby Glenasmole and the hills around, I think it’s easy to understand how the popular imagination would see in these giant ‘seats’ the haunts of our Celtic supermen. Seefin (Suí Finn), just 3.5 kms to the south of Seahan, makes the association explicit.

There are no less than three megalithic tombs on Seahan. The cairn to the east is a passage tomb, over 21m in diameter, with a kerb of elongated granite stones. On top of the cairn can be seen the capstone (visible in the photo) over the central chamber. The second cairn, now topped with a trig pillar, is almost 24m in diameter and 2m high. It appears never to have been opened. A short distance further west lie the shattered remains of a wedge tomb – a kind of burial that is considered unusual above 300m.

Seahan can easily be included in a circuit that includes Corrig (the only top without a megalithic monument), Seefingan and Seefin. It’s a walk I have recorded as being approximately 12 kms. The route practically follows the boundary line and, indeed, the stumpy granite boundary markers (one of which sits atop the cairn on Seefingan) around the military firing-range of Kilbride and loops back along the stretch of road in front of it. To enjoy this walk, you definitely need either a good dry spell beforehand, or preferably hard frost. Otherwise, be prepared to get an unpleasant sinking feeling along many a stretch. Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/3552/

The OS sheet only indicates a cairn and megalithic tomb on top of Seahan, but there is also a wedge tomb only a stone’s throw just west of these two. To my mind, it’s the most photogenic of all three, despite the few shattered slabs that remain. It has had perhaps four thousand years of history wash over it and still resists. It has seen off the heroic huntsmen of the Fianna who allegedly roamed these hills and will see off too the mud-bespattered bikers who now rake up the earth around it. If you are looking for a little taste of timelessness, why not nestle down in the tomb and think yourself back into the mysterious world of the Neolithic chieftain who was once laid in it? Maybe the whisper you hear will not only be the rustle of the wind in the heather… Well, it’s just a suggestion.

Normally such tombs were not built above 300m, but this one lies at twice that height. Considering the many other tombs that bedeck all of these hills, one might sometimes feel like being in a necropolis here. In the photo, you can see Seefingan on the left, with its cairn, and Seefin on the right, with its impressive passage grave. Those living in the plains below could never have felt that their dead were far away.

In the photo you can also make out in the distance the snowy top of Mullaghcleevaun, with its north-facing corrie. Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/4494/

A very quick hike up Seahan starts the first of 4 mountains.Seahan,Corrig mt,Seefin and Seefingan Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/5828/

Looking southwards from Seahan, the hazy planes of several hills seem to overlap in the distance: Seefingan, Seefin, Sorrel. In reality, they form, together with Seahan, a wide arc, with Seefingan at 2.67 kms distance, Seefin at 3.52, and Sorrel at 8.70, as the crow flies. They are all linked, too, through the presence of megalithic cairns on each one. The distant mounds are perfectly visible in the photo, at least at full resolution, and are not exactly on the summit of each hill but slightly lower down to the west, facing out across the fertile plain that laps up against the hills of north-west Wicklow, along the borders with Kildare and Dublin.

The picture that archaeology provides of this area gives enormous added interest to walking in these hills. It takes us back to the development of farming in neolithic times, when organised communities cultivated here the lowland fringes of the central plain, yet buried their eminent dead in elaborate hilltop tombs. The similarities in construction and symbolism all point to a common social and religious outlook that one would love to be able to grasp.

As far as the hills themselves are concerned, one thing that leaves me pensive is the fact that, even at that early stage, the human impact on the terrain was already quite notable. From an examination of the pollen record preserved deep in the bog (and one such study was made precisely in the area between Seefin and Seefingan), there is evidence of the prehistoric clearance of trees for pasture and of the later burning of the moorland that replaced the woods. Today we complain of the ugly clear-felling of forest and the recurring summertime ritual of turning the heather to ashes, but, for better or for worse, these are things that have been carried on here in the hills for well over four thousand years! Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/3551/

Question for regular climbers of Seehan. I am doing research on Peat landslides and the causes of them. There is one south-west of seehan, which is clearly visible from its summit (see picture). I am wondering if any hillwalkers would know anything about when it happened?
email noel.boylan@ucd.com Linkback: https://mountainviews.ie/summit/200/comment/2036/