Ringfort (Rath), Loughanstown, Co. Westmeath
Co. Westmeath |
Ringforts
On a prominent ridge in County Westmeath, a ringfort sits that is considerably larger than most of its kind.
Where the average Irish rath, an enclosed farmstead of the early medieval period typically defined by one or more earthen banks, might measure thirty or forty metres across, this one stretches to roughly 55 metres north to south and 64 metres east to west. That scale alone sets it apart from the thousands of similar enclosures scattered across the Irish countryside.
The enclosure is defined by a substantial bank and a wide, deep fosse, the fosse being the external ditch whose steep sides and flat bottom would once have made the whole structure considerably more imposing than it appears today. Centuries of agricultural activity have taken their toll. The enclosing bank has been steepened along its north-eastern to east-south-eastern arc and absorbed into a field fence, while quarrying has defaced the western side. The fosse itself has been filled in along the east and south-east. A 2011 aerial photograph showed that much of the bank from north-north-east around through east, south, and south-south-west had been levelled to little more than a low scarp, with surviving sections folded into post-1700 field boundaries. A possible entrance gap of about 2.5 metres survives at the south-east. Inside, the ground slopes gently from west to east, and faint cultivation ridges running north-west to south-east hint at later agricultural use of the interior. A second hilltop enclosure lies approximately 180 metres to the north-west, suggesting this ridge held some significance over a broader area rather than as a single isolated site.