Ringfort (Cashel), Kilbeg By.), Co. Cork

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Ringfort (Cashel), Kilbeg By.), Co. Cork

A laneway cuts straight through the middle of this early medieval enclosure in West Cork, an intrusion that gives a sense of how thoroughly the rhythms of farming life have long since settled over what was once a defended homestead.

The cashel, as a stone-built ringfort is known in Irish, sits on a north-facing slope in pasture at Kilbeg, its roughly circular interior measuring thirty-two metres east to west.

The enclosing bank stands about 1.2 metres high, and its varying condition tells a quiet story of repair and neglect across many centuries. On the south-south-west to north-west arc, dry stone walling with a rubble core is still clearly visible, the kind of construction typical of these early medieval farmstead enclosures, built without mortar and relying on carefully packed stone for its strength. On the opposite side, from north-north-east around to south-east, the original wall has collapsed and gone under grass, and a modern wall has been laid on top of it, the old boundary quietly pressed into service again. Two entrance gaps survive, each about two metres wide, one to the south-east and one to the north-west, and it is roughly along this axis that the laneway now runs, suggesting the modern farm track may follow a route that is older than it looks.

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