What is recorded here

Half-buried in Galway grassland, the Cloonnacross ringfort keeps its southern and western edges sharp while the northern rim has softened into a low rise. It is not a grand castle but a shallow bowl of earth, wide enough to hold a small household and narrow enough to force everyone inside to remain visible to one another. The field wall now cuts through both ends of the circle, turning an ancient boundary into an ordinary farm line. What was once a defended home has become a landscape memory, its shape preserved only because the land still remembers the digger’s effort.

In undulating grassland overlooking bogland to S. Very poorly preserved subcircular rath (N-S 36m, E-W 32m) defined by a scarp and external fosse from S through W to N; a lowrise forms the enclosing element elsewhere. A field wall cuts the monument at N and S. An enclosure (GA006-050----) lies c. 300m to WNW. (Knight c. 1975, 21; Conway c. 1980, 15) The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Galway Vol. II - North Galway'. Compiled by Olive Alcock, Kathy de hÓra and Paul Gosling (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1999). Date of upload: 05 August 2010

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