Barrow (Ring Barrow), Knocknaranhy, Co. Clare

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Barrows

Barrow (Ring Barrow), Knocknaranhy, Co. Clare

A low earthen mound sitting on a hillock in County Clare sounds unremarkable enough until you notice that it is not alone.

This ring-barrow at Knocknaranhy, barely visible above the surrounding pastureland, has a near-identical companion monument sitting just 21 metres to the east, the two of them quietly occupying the same slight rise in the landscape, commanding wide views in every direction.

A ring-barrow is a funerary monument of prehistoric origin, typically consisting of a central burial mound encircled by a ditch, known as a fosse, and an outer earthen bank. The example at Knocknaranhy is subcircular in plan, measuring roughly 14.5 metres east to west and 13 metres north to south. At its centre is a flat-topped earthen mound about 5.1 metres in diameter and no more than 0.3 metres high, so modest in height that it could easily be dismissed as a natural feature. Around it runs a flat-based, steep-sided fosse, and beyond that a rounded outer bank. What gives the monument a little more definition on the ground is a deliberate entrance gap on the southern side, roughly 2.9 metres wide, with a causeway crossing the fosse to reach the mound within. The site appeared on Robinson's map of 1977 as a barrow, though it was later catalogued somewhat vaguely as an enclosure in the Record of Monuments and Places in 1996, a reminder of how easily these subtle earthworks resist easy classification at a glance.

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Pete F
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