Designed landscape feature

The National Monuments Service's description

Located at the summit of a drumlin. A large, perfectly circular enclosure is depicted only on the 1907 edition of the OS 6-inch map. This is a circular grass-covered area (diam. c. 100m) that slopes down to the E and which is defined by a field bank (Wth 1-2m; max. H c. 0.75m) and hedge with an outer fosse or drain (at NNE: Wth 2.5m; int. D 1.2m). The bank is visible on the W, N and E but is almost non-existent on the perimeter at S. The fosse has been re-cut and the entrance at NNE (Wth c. 16m) has been widened in modern times. There are no visible archaeological features in the interior.
The enclosure is large enough to be considered a hilltop enclosure, but it is 1.6 km S of the SW tip of a large landscape design known as ‘the Thistle’ (TY060-042), just W of Aughancloy village, for which see this page of the Northern Ireland SMR database accessed on 23/06/2017: http://appsc.doeni.gov.uk/ambit/Details.aspx?MonID=14768 The Thistle was designed after 1722 by Acheson Moore, a jacobite, as a symbol of his political sympathies. Three other hilltop enclosures in Co. Monaghan are between 1 and 2 km from the SW tip of the Thistle, and together with four other large enclosures in Co. Tyrone could have been designed to enhance the Thistle as outlying rosettes. The equally large enclosure at Raflacony (MO001-006----) is c. 800m to the NW and the enclosure at Moy (MO003-010----) is c. 950m to the E.

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of revised upload: 25 July 2017