Hut site, Killarechurch, Co. Westmeath
Co. Westmeath |
Settlement Sites
On a gravel ridge in County Westmeath, in what is now ordinary pasture, the faint outline of a small oval building survives against the interior wall of an ancient ringfort.
It is easy to miss, and that is partly the point. These are the kinds of remains that reward patient looking rather than dramatic presentation.
A ringfort is an enclosed settlement, typically from the early medieval period, defined by one or more circular earthen banks. This particular example at Killarechurch contains, along its north-eastern interior, the fragmentary remains of a roughly oval house site. A low bank of earth and stone, retaining traces of stone facing, runs for approximately four metres from the ringfort's own bank at both the north-east and north-west. The structure is domestic in scale and in its worn-down condition, the kind of dwelling that housed ordinary rural life in Ireland perhaps a thousand or more years ago. The site sits on the top of the ridge with clear views to the north and south-south-east, a position that was likely chosen as much for visibility and surveillance as for any practical convenience. From such a vantage point, the surrounding landscape would have been legible in a way that modern field boundaries and hedgerows now complicate.