Promontory fort - coastal, Fahy, Co. Galway

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Promontory fort – coastal, Fahy, Co. Galway

At Fahy, on the Connemara coast of County Galway, a small triangle of ground jutting out above the mouth of Clifden Bay turns out to be the remnant of a promontory fort, a type of enclosure in which prehistoric or early medieval communities used a headland's natural sea cliffs as a ready-made defensive perimeter, cutting off the landward approach with one or more earthen banks and ditches.

The level interior here measures roughly 35 metres by 30 metres at its widest, which would have made for a compact but purposeful defended space.

What survives is a double-line earthwork across the neck of the promontory. The inner bank is the more impressive of the two, reaching up to 3.2 metres in height and about 6.7 metres in width, and it is separated from a slighter outer bank by a fosse, that is, a cut ditch, with steep sides, a flat bottom, and a width ranging between four and seven metres. The outer bank is considerably reduced, standing only around 0.8 metres high, though whether this reflects original construction or later damage is unclear. Most intriguing is the absence of any visible entrance through the inner bank. Promontory forts typically required some means of passage between the defended interior and the outside world, so the lack of any trace here is a genuine puzzle. A wide break in the outer bank exists but is thought to be of modern origin rather than a preserved original gateway.

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