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Fairy fort / earthen ringfort in Ranaghan

Fairy fort / earthen ringfort

What is recorded here

Kilranaghan, County Clare: a circular bivallate rath, about 43 m across, with a broad inner bank, a round-bottomed fosse and a thinner outer bank, standing in pasture at the west end of a low ridge. Its inner bank still shows broken stone facing, and a later drystone wall rides much of the outer bank, as if people kept rebuilding the edge long after the first shape was made. The name “Fairy fort” may be more wonder than fact, but the place does feel like wonder: a made circle, repeated and maintained, beside a burial ground and under open sky.
In pasture at the W end of a low NE-SW ridge. Classified as an enclosure in the RMP (1996). Hachured on both the first (1842) and Cassini (1916) editions of the OS 6-inch maps. A circular bivallate rath (int. diams. 24.3m E-W; 22.8m N-S; ext. diam. 43m) is defined by a broad inner earthen bank, a fosse and a second, outer bank. The inner bank (Wth 6-7m; int. H 0.9-1.3m; ext. H 1.6-2m) has internal stone facing traceable intermittently from E-S-NW. The fosse (Wth at top 5.6-6m; Wth at base 1-2m; ext. D 1m) is round-bottomed and is girdled by the outer bank (Wth c. 2m; H 0.5m) which is best preserved at NW and surmounted for nearly its full course, from N-E-S-W, by a later drystone wall. There is an entrance gap (Wth 2m) at ENE. ‘Kilranaghan’ enclosure (CL017-104002-), containing a burial ground (CL017-104----) lies c. 100m to the E.   Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy and Eve Campbell   Date of upload: 21-10-2025

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What survives
Recorded monument

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