Ringfort (Rath), Aughris, Co. Sligo

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Ringfort (Rath), Aughris, Co. Sligo

On a low rise in rough coastal pasture at Aughris in County Sligo, a circular earthwork sits quietly in a landscape that seems to have forgotten it is there.

It is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, a type of enclosed farmstead typically built during the early medieval period, roughly between the fifth and twelfth centuries. Thousands of them survive across Ireland, yet each one carries its own particular character, shaped by whoever built it, whatever materials were to hand, and whatever damage the centuries have managed to inflict.

This example measures approximately 42 metres across its north-south axis, which places it toward the larger end of the ordinary range. What gives it a degree of technical interest is the way its boundary was constructed using two distinct methods. Along the south-west, there is a proper earthen bank, nearly three metres wide, rising about 45 centimetres above the interior and a more substantial 1.5 metres above the surrounding ground. Elsewhere, the enclosure is defined by a vertically cut scarp, a clean, almost cliff-like drop in the earth, reaching 1.9 metres on the western side. Notably, the outer faces of both the bank and the scarp have been reinforced with stone, giving the structure a mixed character that is part earthwork, part dry-stone revetment. A modern field boundary cuts through the eastern half of the interior along a roughly north-to-south line, and immediately east of it the north-eastern quadrant of the rath has been lost entirely, most likely cleared at some point for agricultural use. Whatever entrance originally served the enclosure has not survived in any recognisable form.

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Pete F
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