Adolf Mahr and the Harvard archaeologists were interested in extending the Irish Free State archaeological programme to Northern Ireland. County Antrim was considered to be unsuitable for a social and physical anthropological survey because of its history of colonisation. Antrim was rich archaeologically with plenty of forts, ‘dolmens’ and lake-dwellings. In Hencken’s view its main importance was that there were ‘a series of sites which have produced evidences of post-Palaeolithic stone cultures, said to be Asturian and Campignian’ providing ‘the earliest traces of man in the island’.104 He believed that these early inhabitants of Ireland ‘had made their way into Northern Ireland from the Continent when both Ireland and Great Britain were joined together and to the rest of Europe by land-bridges’.105 Hencken considered that it would be easy to excavate in the North without prejudicing Harvard’s work in the Irish Free State. Also, they would be likely to discover more finds which they could export to the United States. Movius carried out an examination of the lithic sites in Northern Ireland between 18 July and 1 August 1933.106 This work was facilitated by the Ancient Monuments Advisory Council, whose chairman, William Patrick Carmody, the Dean of Down, extended to them ‘every hospitality and facilitated our work in every possible way’.107 Excavations in Northern Ireland commenced during the Third Harvard Archaeological Expedition in 1934.
Adolf Mahr could see how potentially useful the archaeologist Claude Blake Whelan’s knowledge and assistance would be to the Harvard Expedition in Northern Ireland. Blake Whelan was later credited by Hencken as ‘the only archaeologist in Ireland who has any real knowledge of the Irish Stone Age’.108 In 1933, Blake Whelan brought Movius on a guided tour of the lithic sites in Northern Ireland. He was from Belfast and worked for the Electricity Board of Northern Ireland and was a member of the Royal Irish Academy. Hencken noted that it was often hard to discern the places where Stone Age man lived as ‘his graves are largely unknown and his presence can only be detected by the well-trained eye in the small pieces of flint and other stones that he shaped into tools’.109 According to him, local archaeologists who were familiar with such sites were unlikely to guide foreign excavators to them. This was not the case in Ireland as they had ‘an excellent and unselfish supporter’ in Blake Whelan, who had ‘an unrivalled knowledge of the homes of prehistoric hunters of the Irish Stone Age.’110 Hencken admitted that without Blake Whelan’s help their work ‘could not have been accomplished’.111 Mahr made the suggestion that Blake Whelan should be encouraged to carry out an excavation with Hencken and Movius, which should be subsequently published under Blake Whelan’s name. This was to be financed by the Harvard Mission.112 Movius and Blake Whelan dug at Rathlin Island, in 1934.113 This was a site which had been found by Blake Whelan some years previously but it had not been excavated or published. Blake Whelan was elected a delegate for Northern Ireland to the Prehistoric Society of France in 1932, on the proposal of Dr Marcel Baudouin, the honorary president of the society, with whom Whelan had collaborated on a paper on the diorite axes of Rathlin Island.114
The sites which Blake Whelan showed Movius included the Mesolithic raised beach site of Larne; Island Magee with its lower estuarine deposits ‘containing probably the oldest cultural horizon in Ireland’; the raised beach at Glenarm; the raised beach at Cushendun, below which ‘is an industry possibly allied to Azilian’; Bronze Age middens at Whitepark Bay; the Bann Valley with its Neolithic stone industries; and Lough Neagh.115 A Mesolithic site at Glenarm, County Antrim, which had been discovered by Blake Whelan, was excavated between 5–25 July 1934 by Movius and his team. Hooton was informed that, except for Larne, this was the first Irish raised beach section ever examined; it provided important chronological information’.116 Over a ton of flint tools were sent to the Belfast Museum. In Movius’s report, published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland in 1937, the author commended Blake Whelan because he had ‘noted the stratigraphy and photographed the exposed section’.117
The Harvard Mission archaeologists wished to excavate some megalithic tombs, which they believed were introduced to Ireland from Spain, and accordingly they identified some undisturbed tombs they wished to dig. They were interested in excavating Rathcroghan which they believed was built by the Celts who had arrived in Ireland from the continent about the fourth century BC. Hencken expressed an interest in the Moytirra megalithic cemetery as it was the only site in Ireland which had produced Breton bell beakers at that time. These highly decorated pots date from the Late Neolithic period through to the Bronze Age (c.2900–1800 BC) and were found over large areas of central and western Europe. He was also interested in monuments such as the stone tumuli visible on the summits of Keishcorran, Slieve Deane and Ox Mountains, a lake-dwelling near Ballymote, numerous forts, and the monastic settlement on Inismurray.
However, despite its archaeological riches, Sligo was considered to be unsuitable for a social and anthropological survey. The reason for this, as Warner pointed out, was that ‘Sligo has always been one of the gateways of Ireland’. Hencken considered that:
It is unfortunate that this very factor, which helps to render Sligo useless from the point of view of social anthropology, makes it of extreme archaeological significance, especially at the beginning of the Metal Ages, when the dolmens were being built and when Ireland played a leading role in the cultural development of Northern and Western Europe. At only one other time, the early Christian period, has Irish civilization been of comparable importance.118
Hencken registered his interest in the Carrowkeel passage-tomb cemetery as it ‘closely resembled architecturally ‘the best cupola tombs of the Iberian peninsula’. He was also fascinated by the passage tomb complex at Carrowmore in Sligo.119 Morris showed him the megalithic monument known as Leac Chon Mhic Ruis, ‘an immense cairn upon which is a megalithic monument 100 feet long consisting of a courtyard upon which open three double-chambered galleries’. Morris also showed him other similar tombs.120
Hencken came to the conclusion that if Clare was decided upon for the full survey – social, physical and archaeological – it would be best to do an archaeological survey based on published materials. Sites could be planned, photographed and some selected for excavation. As he regarded few sites to be suitable for excavation in Clare, other forts, lake-dwellings and tumuli could be excavated around the country in an effort to throw light on Clare in particular and on Ireland in general. As Clare formed part of the old kingdom of Connaught he thought it advisable that other sites selected should be in this area. This would include the dolmens of Sligo and Rathcroghan. Warner subsequently wrote to Hencken and expressed the view that County Clare was better from his point of view. Hencken was not as enthusiastic about excavating sites in Clare as he had been about those in Sligo as the former ‘has only a few of much interest to the excavator’. He regarded the numerous dolmens of Clare to ‘belong to the family of large cists, the least interesting and instructive type’. He was also disappointed at the number of them that were ‘badly wrecked’ and were therefore unlikely to conceal undisturbed prehistoric burials. He was convinced that ‘although Clare is not the richest archaeological area in Ireland, the Irish field as a whole, which is a largely untouched one, promises amply to repay the work now contemplated’.121 In 1931, Hencken’s attention was drawn