Enclosure, Ballyganner, Co. Clare

Co. Clare |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Ballyganner, Co. Clare

On the karst pavement of County Clare, where exposed limestone lies flat and grey beneath patches of grass and moss, a small subcircular enclosure sits quietly at the base of a natural step in the rock.

The step itself rises about one and a half metres, facing east, and the western arc of the enclosure wall has been built directly into its lower slope, using the landscape's own geometry as part of the structure. The wall has largely collapsed, surviving to only about half a metre in height for most of its circuit, though it reaches roughly eighty centimetres on the eastern side. It is between one and a half and three metres wide in places, the kind of spread that suggests a once-substantial dry-stone construction slowly loosening over centuries. The interior measures about eleven and a half metres north to south and just over ten metres east to west.

What makes the site more than a solitary ruin is its setting within a large multiperiod field system, meaning the landscape here accumulated human organisation across several distinct eras rather than in a single planned episode. The enclosure itself is one node in a cluster of early settlement features. A cashel, roughly twenty-two metres to the west-southwest, is the nearest neighbour. A cashel is a stone-walled circular or oval enclosure, typically associated with early medieval settlement in Ireland, often interpreted as a farmstead or defended homestead. A hut site lies about seventy-eight metres to the southwest, and a second cashel sits roughly a hundred and eight metres to the south. Together they suggest this part of the Burren was once a populated and organised agricultural landscape, its inhabitants working out how to farm and shelter on terrain that offers thin soil, reliable stone, and very little else in the way of raw material.

The collapsed walls adjacent to the enclosure on both the east and west sides add to the sense of a place that was once more legible, where boundaries and enclosures connected to one another in ways that are now only partially traceable beneath the moss. The site rewards slow looking rather than quick reading of the landscape.

Rated 0 out of 5

Visitor Notes

Review type for post source and places source type not found
Added by
Picture of Pete F
Pete F
IrishHistory.com is passionate about helping people discover and connect with the rich stories of their local communities.
Please use the form below to submit any photos you may have of Enclosure, Ballyganner, Co. Clare. We're happy to take any suggested edits you may have too. Please be advised it will take us some time to get to these submissions. Thank you.
Name
Email
Message
Upload images/documents
Maximum file size: 100 MB
If you'd like to add an image or a PDF please do it here.

Advertisement