Enclosure, Longford Demesne, Co. Sligo

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Enclosures

Enclosure, Longford Demesne, Co. Sligo

In the undulating pasture of Longford Demesne in County Sligo, a low rise in the ground marks out a circle that has resisted easy explanation for at least as long as maps have been made.

The Ordnance Survey's six-inch map of 1837 recorded it clearly as a circular enclosure, which tells us that even early cartographers recognised it as something deliberate rather than a trick of the land.

What survives today is a slightly raised circular area roughly 23.5 metres in diameter, enclosed by a collapsed drystone wall built without mortar, relying instead on the careful fitting of rough stones. The wall has settled and spread with time, now measuring about 2.7 metres wide where it stands at its most reduced, only around 0.4 metres in internal height. To the east, where the enclosure meets a broader natural rise, the wall spreads considerably further, reaching between eight and nine metres in width, suggesting either a more substantial construction at that point or simply a greater degree of collapse where the ground encouraged it to slump outward. Along the top of that eastern rise, a line of closely set stones forms what is known as a kerb, a deliberate edging that hints at a more considered piece of construction beneath or around it. Circular enclosures of this kind are found across Ireland and could serve many purposes, from a simple farmstead boundary to something with a more ceremonial function, though without excavation the specific use of this one remains open.

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