Field system

The National Monuments Service's description

Surrounding a cashel (MA119-052001-) in lowlying rolling limestone grassland, with good views in all directions.
In 1986 the cashel and a portion of the field system were surveyed and planned to scale (SMR file). The plan shows linear field walls radiating from the cashel and enclosing rectilinear fields. A number of small subrectangular fields (max. dim. 35-55m) wrap around the cashel at E−S, and these are subdivided into smaller spaces by internal walls. One of these fields encloses a ruined rectangular house (MA119-052005-), and a similar rectangular house (MA119-052003-) and a possible house (MA119-052004-) are located within the cashel. Larger rectilinear fields extend beyond the cashel in all directions but their full extent is not clear on the plan. The walls appear to follow a roughly NW−SE axis, and their layout differs from and clearly pre-dates the present-day regular grid of large rectangular fields.
These field walls were subsequently levelled during land reclamation works. When inspected in 2000, the fragmentary outline of some of the walls could still be traced as slight surface undulations or as linear cropmarks.

Compiled by: Jane O’Shaughnessy

Date of upload: 23 August 2023