Ringfort (Rath), Carrowcashel, Co. Sligo

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Carrowcashel, Co. Sligo

Most ringforts in Ireland were enclosed by a single bank and ditch, which makes this one at Carrowcashel quietly unusual.

Sitting in rough pasture on the edge of a ridge in County Sligo, it is defended by three concentric earth and stone banks, each separated by its own fosse, the term used for the broad ditches dug to reinforce such enclosures. That level of effort in construction suggests this was no ordinary farmstead.

The site is roughly circular, with an internal diameter of just over twenty-six metres. The innermost bank, though now eroded to a modest height of around half a metre on the interior, drops nearly a metre down to its fosse. The middle bank is the most worn of the three, rising only about twenty centimetres above the interior ground level. The outermost bank, following the natural edge of the slope, is the most substantial of the surviving features, standing around 1.4 metres on its inner face. A single entrance, roughly three metres wide, opens through the southern arc. Ringforts of this type, sometimes called raths when they are primarily earthen rather than stone-built, are generally associated with the early medieval period in Ireland, roughly the fifth to the twelfth centuries, and were typically used as enclosed farmsteads or the residences of local lords. The triple-bank arrangement here, which is comparatively rare, would have conveyed status as much as it provided security.

The interior is uneven and slopes with the lie of the land, and the banks themselves are considerably worn after centuries of exposure. What survives is enough to read the basic geometry of the place clearly, three rings of earth and stone settling gradually back into the pasture around them.

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