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Enclosure in Oileán Máisean

Enclosure

What is recorded here

Yes. An enclosure in Oileán Máisean, County Galway, still marks a sacred Christian landscape through boulder gaps, faint double walls and an uneven interior that may have held a pond. It is not a distant abstract site; its shapes remain visible beside the church, graveyard and leachtaí, inviting people to walk through a place where faith, memory and local life were still being arranged.
Associated with an early Christian church (GA076-011001-). An entrance gap (Wth 2m) defined by two large rectangular boulders (H 0.6m; L 1.2m; Wth 0.5m) is visible c. 12m to the E of the church. Intermittent traces of double wall-footings are visible extending to the N and S of it. These may be the last remnants of an outer enclosure around the church. The field boundary, visible on an aerial photograph (SMR file), curving around the church from NNW to E to SE may incorporate its outline. Apart from the church, it would have enclosed a graveyard (GA076-011002-), an inner enclosure (GA076-011003-) and two leachtaí (GA076-011005-, GA076-011007-). The interior is very uneven. In a dip, just to the N of the inner enclosure, a wet flaggy area is evident where traces of walling are visible. The main section of the wall (int. L 3.5m; ext. H 0.3m; Wth 0.6m) runs E-W and is composed of a single line of boulders. At its E end a section of double-walling (ext. L 3m; ext. H 0.6m; Wth 0.6m) extends to the N and at its W end a section of single walling (L 1.2m; Wth 0.5m) runs to the N and then kinks to the W (L 2m). It is possible that the wall retained a pond. Compiled by: Olive Alcock Date of upload: 29 April 2014

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What survives
Recorded monument

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