Fort, Ballymahon, Co. Longford
Co. Longford |
Ringforts
Beneath a sports ground on the outskirts of Ballymahon, County Longford, there is a fort that no longer exists above ground, yet still holds a place in the archaeological record.
It is one of those quietly strange situations in Irish heritage, where a monument persists in name and documentation long after the physical thing itself has been erased from the landscape.
When the Ordnance Survey produced its first detailed six-inch mapping of Ireland in 1837, the site was recorded as a circular enclosure and labelled simply "Fort", the designation commonly applied to a ringfort, an enclosed settlement type widespread across early medieval Ireland, typically consisting of a raised circular area surrounded by one or more earthen banks and ditches. That mapping captured something that is now entirely gone. At some point between that first survey and the present day, the monument was levelled, leaving no visible trace at ground level. The field passed into use as a sports ground, and the earthwork that once defined this corner of Longford was absorbed quietly into the flat, moderately drained pasture around it.