Ringfort (Rath), Skreen Beg, Co. Sligo

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Ringfort (Rath), Skreen Beg, Co. Sligo

At the edge of a farmyard in Skreen Beg, a low circular earthwork sits so quietly in the landscape that it could easily be mistaken for a natural undulation in the ground.

This is a rath, the most common type of early medieval settlement in Ireland, typically consisting of a raised interior enclosed by one or more earthen banks, sometimes accompanied by a fosse or external ditch. What makes this particular example quietly interesting is not its scale but its legibility: despite centuries of agricultural activity pressing right up against it, the basic anatomy of the enclosure remains readable.

The raised interior measures roughly 25 metres east to west and 22 metres north to south, enclosed by a narrow earthen bank about 3.6 metres wide. Along the south-western to western arc, the bank has been removed, leaving only a scarp about 0.8 metres high as the defining element on that side. No fosse is visible at ground level. A gap roughly 4 metres wide in the bank to the north-north-east is considered the original entrance. More compelling still is what lies within: a house site extends into the interior from the inner face of the bank at the north-east, and approximately 2 metres beyond the outer foot of the enclosing bank to the north lies a possible hut site. Together, these traces suggest the kind of small, close-knit domestic cluster that characterised early Irish rural life, a household and its immediate dependencies gathered within and just outside a modest earthen enclosure.

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Pete F
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