Ringfort (Rath), Lettertinlish, Co. Cork

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Lettertinlish, Co. Cork

In a pasture on a north-east facing slope in Lettertinlish, County Cork, a low circular rise in the ground marks the remains of an early medieval ringfort, or rath.

A rath is a type of enclosed farmstead, built typically between the sixth and tenth centuries, in which a family homestead was protected by one or more earthen banks. Tens of thousands once existed across Ireland, and while many have been ploughed flat or built over, this one retains enough of its original form to read clearly in the landscape.

The enclosure measures roughly 30 metres north to south and 28 metres east to west, enclosed by an earthen bank that still stands about 1.5 metres high on its interior face. On the northern side, the upper half of the outer bank face retains some stone facing, suggesting the builders reinforced at least part of the structure with dry-laid stonework. An external fosse, which is simply a defensive ditch dug around the outside of the bank, survives to a depth of around 1.1 metres along the south-east to north-west arc, though it has silted up elsewhere over the centuries. Inside the enclosure, in its north-west quadrant, there is a roughly rectangular depression measuring 7 metres long, 2 metres wide, and 0.6 metres deep. Its function is not recorded in the available description, but similar features within Irish ringforts have sometimes been associated with souterrains, which are stone-lined underground passages used for storage or refuge, or with the levelled footprints of earlier structures.

The site sits in working pasture, as many surviving raths do, which is part of the reason it has endured. Farmers across Ireland often left these earthworks undisturbed out of a mix of practicality and the long-standing folk belief that ringforts were fairy forts, places best left alone. That cultural wariness, more than any formal protection, accounts for the survival of a great number of them.

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