Enclosure, Rathmeague, Co. Wicklow

Co. Wicklow |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Rathmeague, Co. Wicklow

On a south-east facing slope in Rathmeague, County Wicklow, sits an oval enclosure that has been almost swallowed by the landscape around it.

Rubble cleared from nearby fields has been tipped onto the site over the years, and vegetation has done the rest, making it effectively inaccessible. The result is a small archaeological feature that now reads more as a mound of overgrown stone than the deliberately constructed boundary it once was.

The enclosure measures roughly 35 metres north to south and 25 metres east to west, defined by a rubble wall approximately 1.5 metres wide. Enclosures of this type, found across Ireland, were typically used to demarcate domestic or agricultural space, and in many cases represent the remains of early medieval settlement activity, though without excavation it is rarely possible to say more than that. What is clear is that someone, at some point, took the trouble to construct a substantial oval boundary on this particular slope, and that the effort was considerable enough to leave a trace still visible, if only just, more than a millennium later.

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Pete F
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