Ringfort (Rath), Lisnarawer, Co. Sligo

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Lisnarawer, Co. Sligo

In the undulating pasture of Lisnarawer, a broad oval platform rises almost imperceptibly from the ground, its edges defined by earthworks so worn and subtle that a casual observer might mistake the whole arrangement for a natural feature of the land.

That would be a mistake. This is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, a type of enclosed farmstead built and occupied across Ireland roughly between the early medieval period and the Viking Age. Thousands survive in various states of preservation, but what makes this example quietly interesting is the combination of its considerable size and its almost studied ambiguity.

The raised interior of the enclosure measures approximately 57.7 metres on its longer axis and 49.5 metres across, making it a substantial example of the type. A low bank of earth and stone, around 3.7 metres wide but only about 0.4 metres high, traces most of the perimeter. On the southern side, the bank gives way to a scarp, a steep-faced natural or cut slope that serves the same enclosing function. Below both the bank and scarp runs a shallow fosse, the term for the ditch that typically accompanied such earthworks, providing both a physical barrier and the raw material for building the bank above it. Beyond the fosse, a more pronounced outer bank, standing about 1.3 metres high, runs from the south around through the west and northwest, suggesting that the site once had a layered defensive or boundary arrangement on at least part of its circuit. No original entrance has been identified, which is not unusual given the degree of weathering; centuries of grazing and the gradual compression of the earthworks can easily obscure what was once a deliberate gap or causeway. Field boundaries from the east, south-east, and south now abut the site, the routine geometry of modern agriculture pressing in on the older, rounder logic of the early medieval landscape.

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