Monday 26 June 2023

Binevenagh

EDITED EXTRACTS FROM THE PARLIAMENTARY GAZETTEER OF IRELAND, PUBLISHED IN 1846


BINEVENAGH. a mountain on the mutual border of the parishes of MAGILLIGAN and Aghanloo, barony of Keenaght, County Londonderry.

It is situated 2¾ miles east of Lough Foyle, 5 south-south-east of Magilligan Point, and 5½ north-east of Limavady.

It is prevailingly verdant, but exhibits some fine specimens of columnar cliffs, and successive terraces of fallen strata, descending tier below tier till they subside into the sandy flats which bound the lough and the ocean.

Binevenagh Mountain (Image: William Alfred Green)

Its summit has an altitude of 1,260 feet above sea-level, and commands a panorama of great extent and uncommon brilliance.

The immediate foreground is sheep-walk, "clothed with flocks;" the more distant foreground consists of the flats of Magilligan, Aghanloo, and Myroe, and the valleys of the Foyle and the Roe, streaked with the silvery belts of the rivers, and powdered and gemmed with cottages, hamlets, villages, seats, and plantations.

The middle grounds display the narrow strait and the wide expansion of Lough Foyle, the ruined fortresses of Greencastle, the ranges and terminations of Inishowen, the inter-texture of land and water along the coast, and the strife and acclivity and plain for ascendency along the skirts of the hills; and the backgrounds are the blue ocean peaks of distant Donegal, the ocean blending with the horizon, and prominences of Antrim receding away to the Giant's Causeway, and the swelling curves of the schistose mountains of Londonderry cutting skylines behind the basaltic forelands which abut boldly upon the plain.

Binevenagh abounds with objects of interest to the naturalist.  

First published in May, 2021.

No comments :