Ringfort, Tullawicky, Co. Galway
Co. Galway |
Ringforts
A modern road cuts straight through the eastern side of this ancient enclosure, a quietly jarring reminder of how casually later centuries have treated the landscape's older inhabitants.
The ringfort at Tullawicky sits on a rise in the undulating grassland of north County Galway, its circular form still readable from the ground despite the intrusion.
The monument is a rath, the most common type of ringfort in Ireland, typically a farmstead enclosed by earthen banks and used from the early medieval period onwards. This one measures 35.7 metres in diameter and is defined by two concentric banks with a fosse, or ditch, running between them. The double-bank arrangement would once have made it a fairly substantial enclosure, suggesting a household of some local standing. The site is in fair condition overall, though several gaps in the inner bank appear to be of modern rather than ancient origin, the result of farm clearance or simple neglect rather than anything more dramatic.