Field system

The National Monuments Service's description

On a plateau of limestone pavement on top of a ridge; the ground drops steeply in an escarpment at NE while at SW the slope is more gradual. A pattern of subrectangular fields on a NE-SW axis covering an area of c. 300m NW-SE x c. 200m NE-SW, superseded by a modern rectilinear field system on a NNE-SSW axis, is visible in an aerial photograph (CUCAP, AVI 68) taken in 1968. The field system is very difficult to trace on the ground. Immediately to SE and S of a hut site (SL040-121004-), the plateau is cloaked in a dense wood of hazel and blackthorn. Elsewhere the surface is uneven, broken in parts by exposed karst pavement, strewn with stones and dotted with hawthorn and blackthorn scrub. Land reclamation appears to have removed or levelled many of the walls. Disconnected fragments survive as low jumbles of limestone slabs (Wth 0.8-1m; H 0.2-0.4m) but no individual fields could be identified. A rath (SL040-122----) lies at the NW edge of the field system.

The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Sligo' compiled by Ursula Egan, Elizabeth Byrne, Mary Sleeman with Sheila Ronan and Connie Murphy (Dublin Stationery Office, 2005).

Date of upload: 18 January 2008