164 historic sites29 scheduled monuments27 listed buildings7 archaeological periods
BELCOO and GARRISON covers 595.9 km² in Northern Ireland. With 164 historic sites and 29 scheduled monuments on record, the ward sits at the 94th percentile across all 462 NI wards for combined archaeological heritage. It also records 27 listed buildings (HED Historic Buildings Record), the 58th percentile for listed-building density across NI wards. Per 1,000 residents, this works out at 83.4 recorded sites — the 98th percentile across NI wards (a measure of heritage density relative to current population). Dated archaeological evidence runs from the Mesolithic through to the Modern period, spanning 7 archaeological periods, placing the ward in the 79th percentile NI-wide for chronological depth.
BELCOO and GARRISON boundary detailBELCOO and GARRISON in regional context
Heritage at a glance
Percentile rankings throughout this profile compare each ward only against the other 461 Northern Ireland wards.
164
Historic sites
97th percentile
29
Scheduled monuments
98th percentile
27
Listed buildings
58th percentile
0.37
Sites per km²
Population context
4
Persons per km²
0th percentile
83.4
Sites per 1,000 residents
98th percentile
2,637
Total residents (2021)
The recorded heritage of BELCOO and GARRISON
Of the 164 historic sites recorded, the most common are Rath (26, 16% of historic sites), A.P. Site – Circular Cropmark (13), and Sweat House (9). For Raths, this is the 93rd percentile across NI wards that record this type. For A.P. Site – Circular Cropmarks, this is placing the ward in the top 4% nationally for this type. Across the ward's 595.9 km², this gives a recorded density of 0.37 sites per km² (all heritage types combined). Scheduled monuments are distributed across approximately 0.16° of latitude and 0.24° of longitude within the ward, indicating dispersed rather than clustered placement.
Most common monument types
Type
Count
Description
Rath
26
—
A.p. Site – Circular Cropmark
13
—
Sweat House
9
—
Chronological distribution
Mesolithic
33
Middle Late Bronze Age
5
Iron Age
11
Early Medieval
53
Medieval
1
Post Medieval
6
Modern
7
Unknown
48
Note: 29% of historic site records carry an ‘Unknown’ period attribution. The chronological breakdown above reflects only the dated subset.
Terrain and environment
With a mean elevation of 129m, this ward sits above the NI median (83th percentile), but the ward reaches 346m at its highest point — a vertical span of more than 217m within its boundary, indicating significant topographic diversity. Mean slope is 5.1° (74th percentile across NI), giving moderately undulating terrain. The Topographic Wetness Index of 10.2 (40th NI percentile) indicates moderate drainage, balanced between upland shedding and lowland accumulation. The land-cover mosaic combines improved grassland (61%), woodland (29%), and open water (10%), giving a mixed agricultural and semi-natural landscape. In overall character, this is elevated but relatively gentle terrain — typical of plateau country, with land use dominated by improved grassland.
Terrain measurements
Mean elevation129 m 84th pct
Max elevation346.3 m 86th pct
Mean slope5.1° 75th pct
Wetness index (TWI)10.24 41st pct
Grassland60.7% 56th pct
Woodland28.9% 79th pct
Where this ward sits in NI
Elevation
84th
Slope
75th
Drainage
41st
Grassland
56th
Woodland
79th
Geology and preservation
The dominant bedrock formed during the Palaeozoic era (Carboniferous period). Ancient sedimentary or metamorphic rock dating to before the age of dinosaurs; the resulting landscape has been long-stable enough to host every period of human activity. Bedrock composition is varied (complexity index 0.71, on a 0-1 Simpson-style scale), with multiple geological units within the ward boundary. Geologically diverse wards historically offered a wider range of stone types for building, toolmaking, and quarrying — a relevant factor when interpreting the material culture of nearby sites.
Bedrock eraPalaeozoic
Bedrock periodCarboniferous
Peat coverage0.0%
Bedrock complexity0.71
Placename evidence
The combined OSNI, Logainm NI, and GeoNames sources record 150 placenames for this ward. Diagnostic heritage strata identified within these are: 1 pre-Christian defensive (rath-, dún-, lios-, caiseal-), 14 ecclesiastical (cill-, teampall-, mainistir-, díseart-), and 3 Plantation-era (17th c English/Scots settlement names). Note: Irish-language (name_ga) forms are recorded for roughly half of NI placenames in the combined sources, so anglicised forms whose Irish original could belong to multiple categories may be misclassified.
Placename categories
Ecclesiastical (kil-, temple-, monaster-)14 names
Pre-Christian Defensive (rath-, dun-, lis-)1 name
Plantation Era3 names
Scheduled monuments in BELCOO and GARRISON
Scheduled monuments are sites legally protected under the Historic Monuments and Archaeological Objects (Northern Ireland) Order 1995, designated by the Historic Environment Division (HED).
Grounding History: 10 Maps of Northern Ireland’s Past
A spatial history report bringing together analysis of all 462 wards into one place through 10 high-quality maps — covering monument density, archaeological periods, placename heritage, terrain, wetland, and the historic landscape at first survey.
A ward is the smallest electoral and statistical geography used by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA). The boundaries used here are the 2014 NISRA / OSNI Wards (462 across Northern Ireland), each typically covering 1-700 km² and a population of a few thousand. Wards do not align with parishes, townlands, or any historic administrative unit — they are a modern statistical convenience, used here only as a fixed spatial frame within which to summarise heritage records.
What counts as a site?
Three distinct heritage record types are reported separately, not combined: (1) Historic Sites — entries in the Northern Ireland Sites and Monuments Record (NISMR), the inventory of recorded archaeological sites and findspots, dated from prehistoric to early-modern; (2) Scheduled Monuments — sites legally protected under the Historic Monuments and Archaeological Objects (NI) Order 1995 and maintained by the Historic Environment Division (HED); (3) Listed Buildings — buildings of architectural or historic interest protected under the Planning Act (NI) 2011 and graded A, B+, B1, B2, or Record-Only by HED. A site appearing in more than one register is counted in each register independently.
Editorial principles
These ward profiles describe evidence, not history. They report what is recorded, not what occurred. Where the data is ambiguous, we say so. We do not infer historical processes — population movements, settlement expansion, periods of decline — from patterns in the record. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence: in Northern Ireland, where antiquarian survey was uneven and modern excavation is geographically biased, a gap in the record almost always reflects the limits of recording rather than a genuine historical absence. We mark such gaps explicitly where they appear in the data.
Limits of coverage and known caveats
Several caveats apply to every ward profile: (1) NISMR coverage is uneven across NI — some areas (notably parts of the south-east and the Belfast urban fringe) have been more intensively surveyed than others, so a low recorded site count does not reliably indicate a low past density of activity; (2) period attributions in NISMR are often 'Unknown', and chronological breakdowns reported here reflect only the dated subset; (3) placename classification depends on the Irish-language form (name_ga), which is recorded for approximately 50% of NI placenames in the combined sources, so ecclesiastical and pre-Christian counts may be understated where anglicised forms remain unparsed; (4) terrain percentile ranks compare each ward only to the other 461 NI wards; they are not absolute thresholds. For absence-dominant land cover categories (wetland, water, cropland), percentile ranks are suppressed below 1% raw value, since the ranking of zero-value wards is not meaningful.
Data sources (11)
Northern Ireland Sites and Monuments Record (NISMR)
Spotted an error? This dataset is updated continuously.
Email contact@danielkirkpatrick.co.uk with corrections, missing records, or suggestions for improvement.
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