Enclosure

The National Monuments Service's description

In deciduous woodland, on a generally level, elevated area overlooking the creek of a meandering stream to E. It is recorded by Westropp (1914-16, 66-67) as the northernmost of two enclosures which he labelled ‘I’ on his map ‘Gorteen Group of Forts’ and he describes it as ‘a levelled ring’. Westropp (ibid.) continues: ‘A small knoll has been cut off from an angle of the low plateau by two trenches at right angles, and levelled and shaped into a flat-topped, oblong platform, 90 feet long, east and west, and 54 feet wide, with a slight fence, 3 feet thick to the west and south, probably once palisaded. On it was a house [CL035-118002-], 60 feet east and west by 30 feet, the wall only a couple of feet high. The fosse to the south and west is 9 feet to 12 feet wide below, and 18 feet to 20 feet above. It is 6 feet deep. About the middle of the southern fosse was a stone causeway leading to a ring-wall [CL035-018003-]. Mr Hough, of Gorteen, tells me that when he was a boy, before the river was deepened, the Earl’s House stood on a shallow lake, and water filled its fosse’. The monument is depicted on the 25-inch OS map as a sub-rectangular area (c. 31m E-W; c. 20m N-S) defined by a bank to W and N and by a scarp to E and S. A structure (CL035-118002-) named ‘Earl’s House’ is depicted on this map as being located off-centre to SW, within the interior. A second enclosure (CL035-018003-) is depicted as adjoining to S. This monument was not seen due to its low profile and the dense overgrowth across this ungrazed and largely inaccessible area.

Compiled by: Mary Tunney, Alison McQueen and Vera Rahilly

Date of upload: 30 January 2018

References

Westropp, T.J. 1914-16 Types of ring-forts remaining in Eastern Co. Clare, part IV. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 32, 58-77.