Moated site, Brittas, Co. Kilkenny
Co. Kilkenny |
Castle Features
On a south-facing slope in the upland countryside near Brittas, County Kilkenny, lies the faint outline of what was once a medieval moated site.
This rectangular enclosure, measuring approximately 53 metres from northwest to southeast and 50 metres from northeast to southwest, is now only visible from the air. The site was first identified through aerial photography taken by the Geological Survey of Ireland between 1973 and 1977, which revealed the ghostly cropmarks of a levelled bank and its outer defensive ditch, or fosse.
Moated sites like this one were typically constructed during the 13th and 14th centuries, often serving as fortified homesteads for Anglo-Norman settlers or prosperous farming families. The rectangular shape and defensive features suggest this was likely a small manor house or farmstead, surrounded by a water-filled moat for protection. The bank would have originally stood several metres high, possibly topped with a wooden palisade, whilst the fosse would have been kept filled with water diverted from a nearby stream or spring.
Today, centuries of agricultural activity have completely levelled the earthworks, leaving only subtle differences in soil moisture and crop growth to mark where the bank and ditch once stood. These variations show up as cropmarks in aerial photographs, particularly during dry summers when crops growing over the filled-in ditch remain greener for longer than those on the surrounding land. Though invisible at ground level, from above the site reveals its medieval secrets; a reminder of the layers of history hidden beneath Ireland's pastoral landscape.
