Madam, - Joe Fenwick of the department of archaeology at NUI Galway (January 29th) raises an interesting point about the granting of national monument status to 16 Moore Street by Minster for the Environment Dick Roche.
Mr Fenwick is correct in his assertion that Tara's royal demesne is worthy of national monument status and he has the support of acknowledged experts on the importance of this archaeological landscape.
In their submission to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Environment and Local Government on February 2nd, 2005, the Discovery Programme indicated that "we can claim that we have done more research on Tara than everyone else put together. . . The Discovery Programme's research into the wider landscape over the last 10 years has led to a growing appreciation that parts of the locality other than the Hill of Tara are of importance. . . the evidence available to us suggests that it stretches from Ringlestown Rath to the west of Tara to Rath Lugh to the north of Tara and to Skryne to the east of Tara."
It is precisely through this area that the proposed M3 is to be built.
Mr Roche is to be commended for giving enhanced protection to battlefield sites from the early Middle Ages right through to the 1798 Rebellion ( The Irish Times, January 18th).
I call on the Minister, as a matter of urgency, to now grant enhanced protection to the whole Tara complex. - Yours, etc,
MICHAEL LYNCH, Skreen Road, Dublin 7.