Souterrain, Scurlockstown, Co. Westmeath
Co. Westmeath |
Settlement Sites
On the eastern face of a prominent hillock in the undulating grassland of County Westmeath, a slight depression in the earth marks what may be all that remains of a souterrain, one of the underground stone-lined passages that were built during the early medieval period, most likely for storage or refuge.
It is the kind of feature that rewards a careful eye; from a distance it reads as nothing more than a gentle hollow in the turf, yet that shallow dip extending eastward from a ruined house hints at something deliberately constructed beneath the surface.
The possible souterrain sits in close company with other traces of early settlement. Just 280 metres to the north-east lies a ringfort, the circular earthwork enclosure that was the typical farmstead of early medieval Ireland, and within its western quadrant the low, grass-covered wall footings of a rectangular hut are still visible, measuring roughly 2.6 metres in width and surviving to a height of about 0.4 metres. The slight depression runs eastward from this structure and may represent the collapsed or silted-up remnant of a souterrain associated with it. A bog lies some 500 metres to the north, the kind of waterlogged ground that was a persistent feature of the midland landscape and would have shaped how and where people chose to build.
Visitor Notes
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