Ringfort (Rath), Scraggeen, Co. Tipperary
Co. Tipperary |
Ringforts
On an east-facing slope in the uplands of north Tipperary, a faint circular outline in the ground marks what was once a ringfort, the most common type of early medieval settlement in Ireland.
Thousands of these enclosed farmsteads were built between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries, typically serving as the protected homestead of a single farming family, with the enclosing bank offering a degree of security for livestock as much as for people. This one, near the townland of Scraggeen, is easy to overlook precisely because time has done so much work on it.
The enclosure measures roughly 26 metres across east to west, and what remains of the surrounding bank, originally built from earth and stone, now stands no more than 0.8 metres high and about 2 metres wide, much of it worn down to little more than a scarp, a low stepped edge in the ground rather than anything resembling a wall. Outside the bank there are traces of a fosse, the shallow external ditch that would have added to the defensive effect of the structure, running to between three and four metres wide but only around 0.4 metres deep where it survives. At the western side only, there are possible traces of an outer bank, which would have been an additional line of enclosure and a feature that distinguishes more substantial or higher-status raths from simpler examples. On the eastern side, there appears to be a gap where an entrance once stood, though the evidence is ambiguous and the feature may have been destroyed rather than simply eroded.