Ringfort (Rath), Clonkill, Co. Westmeath

Co. Westmeath |

Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Clonkill, Co. Westmeath

On the summit of a ridge in the rolling grassland of Clonkill, a low circular earthwork sits in a field that has been quietly eating away at it.

Quarrying has taken out the entire eastern quadrant and much of the interior, leaving a monument that is more absence than presence, its surviving arc of bank and ditch tracing only part of what was once a complete enclosure.

The site is a rath, the commonest type of early medieval settlement in Ireland, typically consisting of a circular area enclosed by one or more earthen banks and ditches, within which a farmstead would have stood. This particular example is sub-circular in plan, measuring roughly 40 metres north to south and 35 metres east to west. The enclosing bank survives to just 0.3 metres in height, and the external fosse, a shallow ditch running around the outside of the bank, is about 1.75 metres wide. A gap roughly 3.6 metres across at the north-east is a possible original entrance, a feature that sometimes aligns with practical or symbolic orientations in ringfort design. Two modern field fences now cut across the perimeter, one running north-east to south-west through the western side, another crossing the southern arc, so the monument is further divided by the ordinary geometry of agricultural land management. The townland boundary with Toberaquill runs along a road just 80 metres to the west, placing the fort very close to what is likely an ancient territorial margin.

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Pete F
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