Ringfort (Rath), Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

On the northern edge of the Cloon valley in south Kerry, close to where the Owenroe river has cut a high meander scarp into the boggy pasture, a roughly oval earthwork sits in a position that is quietly deliberate.

It is a bivallate rath, meaning a ringfort, the enclosed farmstead type common across early medieval Ireland, defined here not by two complete circuits of bank and ditch but by a single surviving bank that uses the natural drama of the river scarp as its northern boundary. The scarp does the work of a wall on that side, and the builders clearly knew it.

The rath measures about 33.8 metres across on its northeast to southwest axis and 28.8 metres on the other. The enclosing bank is relatively modest, rising to no more than 0.6 metres above the interior and around 1.1 metres above the ground outside, with some stretches of drystone facing still visible along its outer face, particularly to the east. The external fosse, a rock-cut or earthen ditch that would have reinforced the enclosure, is best preserved at the southeast, where it drops 2.2 metres from the top of the inner bank, flattens to a base about 2.5 metres wide, then rises again to a low outer bank that survives only in this area. The overall effect is less imposing than it once was; a modern trackway runs along the western inner bank, and there is a noticeable area of disturbance immediately to the south.

The most interesting feature lies underfoot. Near the centre of the gently sloping interior, two small stone-filled depressions mark the collapsed roof of a souterrain, an underground passage built of stone, typically used in early medieval Ireland for storage or as a refuge. The passage runs northeast to southwest, and its presence, known from local information, turns what might otherwise appear to be a modest and slightly worn earthwork into something with genuine depth, both literally and historically. It is the kind of detail that does not announce itself.

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Pete F
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