Earthwork, Baunmore, Co. Limerick
Co. Limerick |
Ritual/Ceremonial
In a field in County Limerick, a low circular rise sits quietly in pasture, ringed by a band of trees that marks it out from the surrounding farmland.
It was significant enough to be recorded on the Ordnance Survey's 25-inch map of 1897, yet entirely absent from the earlier 6-inch survey of 1840, which raises the immediate question of whether the earlier cartographers simply missed it or whether it had not yet been identified as a feature worth noting. Either way, it has been sitting in this field, largely unremarked upon, for a very long time.
The earthwork, recorded under the monument reference LI048-049----, measures roughly 21 metres on its north-west to south-east axis and about 17 metres across the other way, making it a modestly sized but distinctly sub-circular raised area defined by a scarp, which is to say a steep natural or man-made slope marking the edge of the raised ground. Its function is not definitively established. A second earthwork lies approximately 80 metres to the north-east, suggesting this part of Baunmore townland may have held more structured activity at some point than the present pastoral landscape implies. Rectilinear cropmarks visible in aerial imagery adjacent to the monument are thought to represent drainage channels connected with land reclamation works, meaning the ground around it has been significantly altered over time. The site was compiled for the record by Fiona Rooney and uploaded in August 2021, drawing on both historical Ordnance Survey maps and more recent ortho-imagery from Digital Globe and Google Earth.
The earthwork sits approximately 160 metres west of the townland boundary with Mortlestown, which gives a reasonable sense of where to look on a map, though the site is on private farmland and access would require the landowner's permission. The tree-lined bank that defines the circular form is the most visible feature at ground level, and it shows clearly in satellite imagery if you want to orient yourself before visiting. The adjacent cropmarks, which appear as faint rectangular outlines in the soil, are the kind of detail that only becomes legible from above or in dry summer conditions when differential moisture in the ground reveals old features buried beneath the surface.