Mound, Caherelly West, Co. Limerick

Co. Limerick |

Ritual/Ceremonial

Mound, Caherelly West, Co. Limerick

On a wooded hillock in County Limerick, a small flat-topped mound sits quietly in pasture, its eastern and south-eastern edge eaten away by quarrying that left a hollow deep enough to read as a wound in the landscape.

The mound is not large, roughly five and a half metres across in either direction, but its position on the summit of the rise called Knockatachaun gives it a presence disproportionate to its dimensions, with open views reaching out in all directions across the surrounding countryside.

The site was recorded by Denis Power and uploaded to the archaeological record in November 2013. The mound is described as sub-oval, defined by a scarped edge, that is, a deliberately shaped slope cut into the hillside to mark its boundary, running to about three metres wide and under a metre high for most of its circuit. Where quarrying has disturbed the southern to south-eastern arc, the scarp widens to four metres and rises to over a metre, the material having been removed at some point and leaving a conspicuous depression. Mounds of this kind appear throughout the Irish midlands and south, and while their origins are not always easy to pin down, many are the remains of early medieval activity, whether burial, assembly, or territorial marking. The notes do not specify a date or function for this particular example, and it would be unwise to assume one.

The mound sits within a ring of mature beech, sycamore and ash trees, which means that in full leaf the approach through the hillock's woodland gives little sense of what lies at the top. The flat summit emerges almost unexpectedly. The quarried depression to the south-east is the most immediately legible feature on the ground, and it is worth circling the full perimeter to appreciate how the scarped edge defines the mound's shape where it survives intact. The site lies in working pasture, so the usual courtesies around farmland apply.

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Pete F
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