Ringfort (Cashel), Cappagh, Co. Sligo

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Cashel), Cappagh, Co. Sligo

What looks, at first glance, like a collapsed field boundary in rough Sligo pasture turns out, on closer inspection, to be a cashel, a type of early medieval ringfort enclosed by a dry-stone wall rather than the earthen bank more common elsewhere in Ireland.

This one, sitting on the eastern edge of a terrace along a stream valley slope at Cappagh, is circular, measuring 23 metres in diameter, with the foundations of its enclosing wall still traceable. The kerbing of large stones on both the inner and outer faces gives away the wall's original intent, even where it has tumbled. The southern and south-eastern stretches remain the most legible; the north-western section has largely collapsed.

The interior holds a few quiet puzzles. The ground rises slightly towards the centre, a feature sometimes associated with the platform ringforts found across Ireland, where accumulated occupation debris built up the interior over generations of use. A later field boundary cuts across the enclosure on a roughly east-west axis, a reminder that agricultural life continued to reshape older monuments long after their original function was forgotten. To the west of centre, a row of stones runs about 3.4 metres toward the north-west, ending near a substantial slab measuring just over a metre in length. More intriguing still are two low arcs of sod-covered walling built against the inner face of the cashel wall, one at the north enclosing a roughly semicircular space about five metres across, one at the south-south-west extending outward to the north-east. These subsidiary enclosures, modest as they now appear, suggest the interior was once organised into distinct functional zones, perhaps for sheltering livestock or housing smaller structures alongside the main dwelling.

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Pete F
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