Ringfort (Rath), Croagh, Co. Limerick
Co. Limerick |
Ringforts
A ringfort that is no longer quite round is, in its own quiet way, telling you something.
This example at Croagh in County Limerick began life as a circular enclosure roughly 27 metres across, the kind of defended farmstead that tens of thousands of families across early medieval Ireland would have recognised as home. At some point, however, a field boundary was driven straight through its western side, slicing off a portion of the original circuit and leaving what survives today as a D-shaped enclosure, measuring around 23 metres east to west. The geometry has been altered, but the underlying structure persists, patient and still legible beneath centuries of agricultural activity.
Ringforts, sometimes called raths when their enclosing element is earthen rather than stone, were typically built between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries, serving as the enclosed farmsteads of free landholding families. The earthen bank that once circled this one survives along the arc running from north-north-west to south-west, with an external fosse, a shallow ditch dug to heighten the effective height of the bank from outside, still traceable along the north-north-east to south-east stretch. Compiled by Denis Power and uploaded to the archaeological record in August 2011, the survey notes that the fosse itself has been further cut into on its southern side by a dry-stone field wall running east to west, adding another layer of later intervention to the site's altered outline. The earthen bank is modest now, rising only about 35 centimetres on its exterior face, but enough survives to read the enclosure's original intent.
The site sits on a gently east-facing slope, currently under pasture, which means access depends on the usual courtesies of approaching farmland. The level interior is largely open grazing, though the western half and the south-east to north-west arc of the enclosing bank are heavily overgrown with briars and bushes, making that portion difficult to examine closely. The clearest impression of the surviving earthwork is likely to come from the eastern and northern sides, where the bank and fosse remain relatively unobscured. Visiting in late autumn or winter, when vegetation has died back, would give the better view of what remains of the ditch profile.