Ringfort (Rath), Corry, Co. Westmeath

Co. Westmeath |

Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Corry, Co. Westmeath

Something quietly odd happened to this ringfort between 1837 and 1911.

When the Ordnance Survey first mapped it for their six-inch series in the earlier year, the enclosure appeared circular, the classic form of an Irish rath, a defended farmstead of the early medieval period typically consisting of a raised earthen bank surrounding a central living area. By the time surveyors returned for the revised edition nearly three quarters of a century later, the same feature was recorded as D-shaped. The ground itself had not moved, but something, perhaps gradual erosion, agricultural interference, or simply a closer look, had altered the picture.

The site sits on a low rise of poorly drained grassland in Corry, County Westmeath, close to a second ringfort roughly 60 metres to the south-south-east. What survives today matches the later D-shaped outline, roughly 35 metres across in both axes, though the enclosing bank has been considerably worn down and survives mainly as a scarp, a low slope rather than a proper bank. The external fosse, a ditch that would once have reinforced the boundary, is only faintly legible now, and only on the southern, western, and northern sides. A field fence and drain, both post-1700 in origin, cut across the western portion of the site, adding a layer of later agricultural geography directly over the earlier one. Inside the enclosure, faint traces of cultivation ridges run from north-north-east to south-south-west, the kind of parallel earthworks left by spade or plough tillage at some point after the ringfort's original use had ended, when the enclosed ground became simply another patch of farmable land.

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Pete F
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