BALLYMENA, a town in Co. Antrim, Northern Ireland, on the small river Braid an affluent of the Maine, 2m. above their junction. Pop. of urban district (1926), 11,873. It is 33m. N.N.W. of Belfast on the Northern Counties (Midland) railway. Branch lines run to Larne and Parkmore on the east coast. The town owes its prosperity chiefly to its linen trade, in troduced in 1733. Brown linen is a specialty. Iron ore is mined in the neighbourhood. Gracehill, a Moravian settlement, was founded in 1746.