Enclosure, Coolishal, Co. Wexford

Co. Wexford |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Coolishal, Co. Wexford

At the northern tip of a low ridge in Coolishal, County Wexford, a rectangular patch of raised ground covered in grass and scrub sits quietly in a field corner, its edges eroded by centuries of agricultural activity.

Most people would walk past it without a second thought. But the slight rise in the land, the earthen bank still standing nearly two metres high on its outer face, and the shallow ditch running along its south-eastern side mark this out as a rath, the remains of an enclosed farmstead of the early medieval period. Raths, sometimes called ring-forts, were the most common form of rural settlement in Ireland between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries, typically enclosing a family's dwelling, outbuildings, and livestock behind an earthen bank and fosse, which is simply the accompanying ditch dug to provide the material for the bank.

What makes this example quietly interesting is its shape. While most surviving raths are roughly circular, this one is distinctly rectangular, measuring approximately 33 metres along its north-west to south-east axis and 29 metres across. The enclosing bank is about four metres wide, with an internal height of only 0.3 metres now remaining on the inside, though the exterior still rises to around 1.9 metres, suggesting the interior ground level has built up over time, or the inner face has simply slumped. A fosse three metres wide and half a metre deep survives at the south-east, and a natural or modified scarp defines the south-western side. Modern field boundaries cut across the northern corners of the monument, a north-east to south-west bank at the north-west and a north-west to south-east bank at the north-east, and these later divisions have almost certainly clipped or obscured whatever remained of the enclosure on those sides.

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Pete F
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