Ringfort - cashel

The National Monuments Service's description

In the NE corner of a modern subrectangular pasture field, located at the NW edge of a low flat-topped ridge, in an area of sharply undulating terrain broken by limestone outcropping.
This greatly ruined enclosure, possibly a cashel, is not shown on the 1838 and 1914 OS 6-inch maps. It consists of a subcircular area defined at NW–SSE by levelled remnants of a drystone wall. The original diameter is uncertain, possibly 35m. The surviving arc of enclosing wall is evident as a low, broadly slumped moss-covered stony rise (Wth c. 2m; int. H 0.1-0.2m; ext. H 0.4-0.45m). At NE–ESE the outer edge of the wall is incorporated into a N–S field fence/hedgerow which more or less respects the curve of the enclosure. The enclosing wall cannot be traced with certainty on the W arc; it may coincide with a break of slope, where there is a natural fall of ground. A farm track skirts the base of this slope at S–SW.
A later N–S field wall, now reduced to low, moss-covered wall footings (Wth 0.8-1m; H 0.1-0.2m), cuts through the W sector of the cashel. It appears to intersect with a perpendicular wall, also ruined, which extending to E through the SE quadrant of the cashel. Surface spreads of loose stones to E of the N–S wall appear to result from efforts to levelling it. In the NE quadrant another concentration of stones, c. 5m across, is focused on a slightly sunken feature, obscured by overgrowth.

Notified to NMS by Brain Doyle.

Compiled by: Jane O’Shaughnessy

Date of upload: 13 March 2020