Ringfort (Rath), Kilnaknappoge, Co. Cork
Co. Cork |
Ringforts
In a pasture field in Kilnaknappoge, County Cork, a low earthen bank curves through the grass in a shape that is almost, but not quite, circular.
Measuring roughly 23 metres north to south and 27 metres east to west, the enclosure is wide enough to have once held a farmstead but modest enough to pass unnoticed by anyone not looking for it. The bank, standing about 1.45 metres high in places, is stone-faced externally in parts, and the stretch running from the ENE to the SSW shows the unmistakable signs of a working landscape that continued long after the original builders were gone, with field clearance material piled against it by later farmers tidying their ground.
This is a rath, the Irish term for the type of earthwork ringfort that once formed the basic unit of rural settlement across early medieval Ireland, roughly from the fifth to the twelfth centuries. Tens of thousands were built, each one typically enclosing a family farmstead within a bank and ditch. What makes this particular example quietly instructive is the way its builders had to adapt to the terrain. The site sits on a slope facing north-north-west, and rather than simply banking up the perimeter, they raised the interior on the north side to create a level platform within. The north bank itself shows stepping caused by slippage over the centuries, the slow movement of earthworks on a gradient making the structure's age visible in its own profile. Faint cultivation ridges run across the interior on a north to south axis, suggesting the enclosed ground was turned over for tillage at some point, whether during the original occupation or in a later agricultural phase is not clear.