Enclosure, Castle-Erkin South, Co. Limerick
Co. Limerick |
Enclosures
In a corner of a Co. Limerick field, a monument has effectively vanished from sight within the span of a decade or so.
What the Archaeological Survey of Ireland recorded in 2005 as a discernible oval enclosure had, by the time a Google Earth image was captured in June 2018, left no visible surface remains whatsoever. The field is undulating pasture, the kind of land that gets quietly improved over generations, and it appears to have done its slow work here.
When the ASI surveyed the site in 2005, they found an oval-shaped area measuring roughly 30 metres on its northwest to southeast axis. It was defined by a scarp, a low step in the ground surface where the land has been cut or has eroded to create a slight vertical face, running from the north-northwest to the south-southeast, with a width of 3.8 metres and a height of just 0.4 metres. A fosse, essentially a ditch, 3.5 metres wide, accompanied it to the northwest, and a low external bank was traceable from the north-northeast around to the south-southeast. These are modest dimensions at the best of times, the kind of earthwork that asks something of your eyes even when conditions are favourable. A faint outline was still readable on Digital Globe orthoimage photography taken between 2005 and 2012, but by 2018 it had gone entirely. The enclosure sits in the northeast corner of its field, with two burial mounds, known as barrows, lying about 20 metres to the south-southeast, and the site of Castle-Erkin some 190 metres to the northwest, suggesting this small area once held considerable significance in the local landscape.
The site is on private farmland, and given that no surface remains were visible as of 2018, there is little to observe with the naked eye on a visit. The surrounding topography does offer good views to the west and south, and the proximity of the barrows and the Castle-Erkin site means the broader area rewards patient attention. The enclosure was compiled into the record by Fiona Rooney and uploaded in July 2020, meaning it at least exists in the archive even if it has all but ceased to exist in the ground. That is, in its own quiet way, part of the story.