Enclosure, Parkstown, Co. Tipperary

Co. Tipperary |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Parkstown, Co. Tipperary

At Parkstown in north Tipperary, a circular enclosure survives in the landscape as little more than a whisper.

The bank that once defined its western arc rises only about twenty-four centimetres above the surrounding ground, and east of the hedgerow that now cuts through the site, there is nothing visible at all. It is the kind of place that rewards patience more than expectation, a site that has been almost entirely absorbed back into the farmland around it.

The enclosure sits on a gentle south-facing slope within rolling, undulating terrain. A nearby ringfort lies to the north, and the proximity of the two sites suggests this corner of Tipperary saw sustained human activity over a considerable period. Ringforts, roughly circular enclosures typically defined by an earthen bank and ditch, were built primarily during the early medieval period in Ireland, often serving as enclosed farmsteads for a single family or small community. Whether the enclosure at Parkstown belongs to the same broad tradition is not certain, but it was already mapped as a distinct circular feature on the first edition Ordnance Survey six-inch map of 1843, and it appears again on the revised edition of 1952 to 1953, which at least confirms it was still legible to surveyors into the mid-twentieth century. Since then, agricultural levelling has reduced it considerably. A hedgerow running north to south now bisects the site, and only the western half retains any faint trace of the original bank, measuring roughly twenty-seven metres north to south and nearly seventeen metres east to west at its outer extent.

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Pete F
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