Ringfort (Rath), Ballyshea, Co. Galway

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Ballyshea, Co. Galway

A large boulder sitting beside a gap in the earthwork is often the quietest kind of evidence, but at this ringfort in Ballyshea it may be doing important work.

That gap, roughly two metres wide on the north-north-east side of the enclosure, is thought to mark the original entrance to the site, and the boulder on its southern flank has likely been keeping that position for well over a thousand years.

The site is a rath, the most common type of early medieval Irish settlement monument, typically consisting of a circular earthen bank enclosing a domestic area where a farmstead once stood. This example is unusually well-defined, measuring nearly 45 metres in diameter and originally defended by two concentric banks with a fosse, or ditch, cut between them. The inner bank survives almost continuously around the circuit, with only a short break at the north-north-west. The outer bank and fosse are less complete, preserved only from the south-west to the west, and a later field wall has been built directly over part of the outer bank, which is a common fate for earthworks that remained useful as boundary markers long after their original purpose was forgotten. Recorded by McCaffrey in 1952, the site sits on a north-facing slope in rolling pastureland, a setting that would have offered its inhabitants both drainage and a degree of visibility over the surrounding landscape. Particularly notable is the souterrain in the north-east quadrant of the interior. Souterrains are underground stone-lined passages or chambers, often associated with ringforts, and were likely used for storage and possibly as places of refuge during times of threat.

The souterrain's presence alongside the double-banked earthwork suggests this was a settlement of some local significance, as both features were typically associated with households of reasonable means in early medieval Ireland.

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