Ringfort (Rath), Carrowreagh, Co. Sligo

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Carrowreagh, Co. Sligo

A drystone wall cuts straight through the middle of this ringfort in Carrowreagh, dividing what was once a unified enclosed space into two equal halves.

That internal division, running north-west to south-east, is not an original feature of the site; it is a later addition, the kind of pragmatic alteration a farmer makes when the old boundaries of a prehistoric enclosure become convenient walls for something else entirely.

A rath, as ringforts of this earthwork type are often called, is a roughly circular enclosure defined by a bank and external ditch, known as a fosse, typically dating from the early medieval period and used as a farmstead or place of status. This one sits on a gently east-facing slope in undulating pasture and measures approximately 32 metres north to south and 30 metres east to west. Its enclosing bank, around 3.8 metres wide, survives to an internal height of about 0.75 metres. The most telling detail of its construction is visible on the south-western arc, where the inner face of the bank is revetted with upright limestone slabs laid flat, a careful piece of stonework that has held its shape far better than the rest of the circuit. The external fosse still reads clearly from the north-west round to the north-north-west, but has been filled in elsewhere. Two gaps in the bank, one six metres wide at the north-west and another five metres wide at the south-east, are modern breaks rather than original entrances.

The interior has been quarried near the north-west and west-north-west, and this disturbance led to a minor interpretive puzzle. A field report from 1991 identified two features within the enclosure as collapsed souterrain passages; souterrains are dry-stone lined underground tunnels associated with early medieval settlement, used for storage or as places of refuge. Subsequent examination found that both features were simply quarry holes. It is a small corrective footnote, but a useful one, a reminder that what looks structured and deliberate underfoot is not always what it seems.

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Pete F
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