House - early medieval, Tullanacorra, Co. Mayo
Co. Mayo |
House
At Tullanacorra in County Mayo, a low rectangular mound sits at the centre of a rath, its purpose still a matter of quiet debate.
A rath, for those unfamiliar, is a ringfort, one of the most common early medieval monument types in Ireland, typically consisting of a circular earthen bank enclosing a domestic settlement. That a structure occupies the central space here is not unusual in itself, but this particular platform is stubborn about giving up its secrets.
The platform measures roughly six metres on its northeast to southwest axis and 7.6 metres on its northwest to southeast axis, and is defined by a sod-covered stony scarp about 0.4 metres high, with a slight internal lip around 1.2 metres wide. Whether this was once a house, as seems plausible, or served some other function, remains uncertain. What adds further texture to the site is a souterrain located immediately to the southwest of the platform. A souterrain is an underground stone-lined passage or chamber, typically associated with early medieval settlement and thought to have served for storage, refuge, or both. A second low scarp runs from the eastern corner of the platform out to the main rath boundary to the southeast, apparently marking a slight drop in the ground level within that quadrant of the enclosure. These features together suggest a more complex internal organisation than the surface, covered as it is in sod and time, immediately reveals.