Bastioned fort

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on the highest point of a hill within Manorhamilton, it would have been just NE of the original town. This is a square enclosure (dims 73m N-S; 73m E-W) with corner bastions (dims 17m N-S; 17m E-W) defined by a coursed limestone masonry wall (max. Wth 0.9m; int. H 1.2m; ext. H 3-6m) built on a plinth over bedrock. There is an 18th-century Church of Ireland church and graveyard in the interior. Archaeological testing (02E0010) inside the SE angle identified a wall that may have been part of a gun-platform (Read 2004b), but archaeological testing (02E1412) on Church Lane just to the W produced no related material (Read 2004a). Further testing (19E0679) immediately outside the W wall and just S of the NW bastion produced no related material (Halpin 2019; excavations.ie 2019: 412)

The above description is derived from 'The Archaeological Inventory of County Leitrim' compiled by Michael J. Moore (Dublin: Stationery Office, 2003). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.

Date of upload: 23 September 2008
Amended: 28 October 2020

References

Halpin, E. 2019 Archeological testing report, Church Lane, Manorhamilton, Co. Leitrim. Licence No. 19E0679. Unpublished report, AHC.

Read, C. 2004b Manorhamilton. Post-medieval. In I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 2002: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 289, No. 1056. Bray. Wordwell.

Read, C. 2004a Church Lane, Manorhamilton. No archaeological significance. In I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 2002: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 289-90. Dublin. Wordwell.