Enclosure, Peppardstown, Co. Tipperary

Co. Tipperary |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Peppardstown, Co. Tipperary

There is nothing to see at this site, and that, in its own way, is the point.

In a field of fallow tillage on level ground near Peppardstown in County Tipperary, a circular enclosure roughly 34 metres in diameter has effectively ceased to exist at ground level. It survives only as a ghostly cropmark, that phenomenon where buried features cause overlying vegetation to grow differently, revealing outlines invisible to a person standing in the field but legible from the air. Aerial photography taken in August 1996 caught just such an impression, a roughly circular shape pressed faintly into the crop, the last readable trace of something that once had a physical presence in this landscape.

The enclosure appeared on the Ordnance Survey six-inch map edition of 1903 to 1904, shown as a circular area with a field boundary running along its western edge in a northwest to southeast direction. By the time a researcher named Cahill visited in 1975, it had already been levelled, the earthworks flattened by agricultural activity at some point in the intervening decades. Enclosures of this general type, circular earthen boundaries often associated with early medieval settlement or farming activity, were once common across Tipperary and the wider Irish midlands, though a great many were lost through land improvement schemes across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A second enclosure sits roughly 150 metres to the northwest, suggesting this part of Peppardstown may once have supported more than one such feature within a relatively small area.

Rated 0 out of 5

Visitor Notes

Review type for post source and places source type not found
Added by
Picture of Pete F
Pete F
IrishHistory.com is passionate about helping people discover and connect with the rich stories of their local communities.
Please use the form below to submit any photos you may have of Enclosure, Peppardstown, Co. Tipperary. We're happy to take any suggested edits you may have too. Please be advised it will take us some time to get to these submissions. Thank you.
Name
Email
Message
Upload images/documents
Maximum file size: 100 MB
If you'd like to add an image or a PDF please do it here.

Advertisement