What is recorded here

Fairy fort in Ballygrace, County Cork: a circular earthen enclosure about fifty metres across, mapped repeatedly from 1842 and levelled in the 1970s. It stood on a south-east facing slope, likely inhabited or used for centuries before barley and machinery erased its bank. What remains is a faint rise and a shadow in old photographs, a small life reduced to soil memory.

In tillage, on SE-facing slope. Depicted as hachured circular enclosure (diam. c. 50m) on 1842, 1905 and 1937 OS 6-inch maps; interior planted with trees on 1905 and 1937 OS 6-inch maps. According to local information, levelled in 1970s. Field planted with barley; slight rise visible in area of site. Circular enclosure visible as soilmark, showing bank, in aerial photograph (GSIAP, R687, May 1977); oval-shaped black spread in area of NW bank. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Cork. Volume 4: North Cork' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 2000). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. Date of upload/revision: 14 January 2009

A fairy fort or earthen ringfort in Ballygrace is a circular enclosure of likely early-medieval date, used as a defensive or agricultural settlement. Local tradition associates it with fairy lore, as suggested by its name and the enduring cultural memory of such sites in Irish folklore.

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