Once you reach the summit of Knocknarea the size of this monster cairn hits you. It is obviously big, because you can see it for miles, but it is (see fig. really) big!
The ruins of the orbital passage tombs make this a centre to be compared with Newgrange (County Meath) and Knowth (County Meath), which also had smaller mounds built around it. Obviously, this also points to Maeve's Cairn being a passage tomb too, but as it's never been opened up nobody know for sure.
As the name suggests this cairn is rumoured to be the burial place of Queen Maeve.
There are two huge stones set diametrically opposite each other at the base of the cairn. One of these looks like a placed flag stone, but the other is a wonderful proto-altar type block - to me it is this stone that is the special thing up here. It is said that a line drawn through these two stones passes over the nearby mountain of Croghan, which has a curious rock-cut passage grave on its peak, which yielded a Carbon 14 date of around 5000bce.
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_A Random Selection of Nearby Monuments
 Baur South (Co. Clare) |  Parknabinnia (Co. Clare) |  Treenearla Commons (Co. Waterford) |
 Treenearla Commons (Co. Waterford) |  Sorrell Hill (Co. Wicklow) |  Tervillin (Co. Antrim) |
