Ringfort (Rath), Corboy, Co. Longford

Co. Longford |

Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Corboy, Co. Longford

In a sloping pasture field in County Longford, an early medieval farmstead has been quietly absorbed into the landscape to the point where a lime kiln, probably a few centuries old at most, is now the most immediately legible feature on the site.

That detail alone tells you something about how thoroughly this place has been reused and reinterpreted across the generations.

The ringfort, or rath, takes the form of a raised circular area roughly 31.6 metres in diameter. A rath is a type of enclosed settlement common in early medieval Ireland, typically consisting of a bank and external ditch enclosing a homestead. Here, the enclosure survives as a wide, low bank of earth and stone, up to 6.2 metres across but only about 0.2 metres high, running from the west-southwest around to the north-northwest. Elsewhere the boundary is defined by a natural or man-made scarp rather than a built-up bank. There is no surviving trace of a fosse, the external ditch that usually accompanied such a bank, and no identifiable original entrance. Built directly into the scarp on the southwestern side is a small lime kiln, a structure used for burning limestone to produce quicklime for agricultural or building purposes, its presence suggesting that whoever worked this land in more recent centuries found the ready-made earthwork a convenient place to site their own modest industry.

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Pete F
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