Field boundary, Maughanasilly, Co. Cork

Co. Cork |

Ritual/Ceremonial

Field boundary, Maughanasilly, Co. Cork

Beneath a coniferous plantation on a north-west-facing slope in County Cork, a set of stone walls has been slowly losing a battle with the bog.

The field boundaries at Maughanasilly are relict features, meaning they were abandoned long enough ago that the land has largely reclaimed them, the stones collapsing and the peat creeping up around them until only the tops protrude above the surface. What remains traces a roughly semicircular outline, around 120 metres across at its widest, with one arm pushing about 60 metres to the south-east. The walls themselves are modest, perhaps half a metre thick and not much more than that in surviving height, but their shape in the landscape still carries the memory of organised agricultural space.

The location tells part of the story. This is rough pasture on a boggy slope, a clearance area within what is now commercial forestry, and the stone boundaries are the traces of a farming system that once operated here before the land became unworkable or was simply abandoned. The bog has since grown over and around them, preserving their outline even as it swallowed the fields they once divided. A fulacht fia, a type of prehistoric cooking site typically identified by a horseshoe-shaped mound of burnt and fire-cracked stone, lies roughly 70 metres to the north-east. These cooking mounds are among the most common prehistoric monument types in Ireland and are generally associated with the Bronze Age, which hints at long human use of this area, though the field boundaries themselves have not been precisely dated.

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 Field boundary, Maughanasilly, Co. Cork. 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