Earthwork, Cross (Coonagh By.), Co. Limerick
Co. Limerick |
Ritual/Ceremonial
There is a circular earthwork in County Limerick that has never quite managed to be seen.
It does not appear on Ordnance Survey historic maps, it cannot be made out in satellite imagery taken between 2011 and 2013, and a Google Earth orthoimage from June 2018 shows nothing either. The only evidence that anything is here at all comes from a single set of aerial photographs taken as part of the Bruff Survey, where the outline of a circular shape is just legible in the crop growth below. Cropmarks of this kind form when buried features, such as the ditches or banks of a former structure, affect how vegetation grows above them, producing subtle differences in colour or height that are invisible from the ground but occasionally readable from the air under the right conditions of light, crop type, and moisture.
The site sits on a slightly raised area of north-facing slope, surrounded by rough wet pasture, the sort of ground that tends to discourage both development and close inspection. What the cropmark suggests is a roughly circular enclosure, possibly a ringfort. Ringforts, which are among the most common monument types in the Irish landscape, were typically enclosed farmsteads dating from the early medieval period, defined by one or more earthen banks and ditches. The record compiled by Alison McQueen and Vera Rahilly, uploaded in July 2020, notes a possible ringfort immediately to the south-east, recorded separately as LI024-058, which raises the question of whether the two features are related, though no firm interpretation is offered. The earthwork itself remains unclassified, carrying the cautious designation of a possible monument rather than a confirmed one.
Because the feature is not visible on the ground or in recent satellite imagery, there is little a visitor standing in the field could expect to observe directly. The wet pasture and north-facing aspect make the ground inhospitable outside of dry summer months, and even then the surface gives nothing away. The cropmark photograph from the Bruff Survey aerial series, referenced as Bruff 110: AP4/3676, remains the primary record. For anyone interested in how aerial archaeology works, this site is a useful illustration of the limits of what can be confirmed: a shape caught once in a particular quality of light, over a particular crop, and not repeated in any subsequent image taken from above.
It does not appear on Ordnance Survey historic maps, it cannot be made out in satellite imagery taken between 2011 and 2013, and a Google Earth orthoimage from June 2018 shows nothing either. The only evidence that anything is here at all comes from a single set of aerial photographs taken as part of the Bruff Survey, where the outline of a circular shape is just legible in the crop growth below. Cropmarks of this kind form when buried features, such as the ditches or banks of a former structure, affect how vegetation grows above them, producing subtle differences in colour or height that are invisible from the ground but occasionally readable from the air under the right conditions of light, crop type, and moisture.
The site sits on a slightly raised area of north-facing slope, surrounded by rough wet pasture, the sort of ground that tends to discourage both development and close inspection. What the cropmark suggests is a roughly circular enclosure, possibly a ringfort. Ringforts, which are among the most common monument types in the Irish landscape, were typically enclosed farmsteads dating from the early medieval period, defined by one or more earthen banks and ditches. The record compiled by Alison McQueen and Vera Rahilly, uploaded in July 2020, notes a possible ringfort immediately to the south-east, recorded separately as LI024-058, which raises the question of whether the two features are related, though no firm interpretation is offered. The earthwork itself remains unclassified, carrying the cautious designation of a possible monument rather than a confirmed one.
Because the feature is not visible on the ground or in recent satellite imagery, there is little a visitor standing in the field could expect to observe directly. The wet pasture and north-facing aspect make the ground inhospitable outside of dry summer months, and even then the surface gives nothing away. The cropmark photograph from the Bruff Survey aerial series, referenced as Bruff 110: AP4/3676, remains the primary record. For anyone interested in how aerial archaeology works, this site is a useful illustration of the limits of what can be confirmed: a shape caught once in a particular quality of light, over a particular crop, and not repeated in any subsequent image taken from above.
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