Fairy fort / ringfort in Burkeen

Recorded in the Ordnance Survey letters of 1838-40 as ‘about half a mile from Rathnew on to Wicklow, it [a stream] passes through what appears to me to have been an ancient rath, a segment of which remains yet on the right hand, with part of a trench five feet [1.5m] wide at bottom, about eight feet [2.4m] deep and cut through the solid rock. This portion of the old fort was called Purteen, i.e. Little Port or Fort, and hence the townland name of Burkeen, on which it is, but properly Purteen’ (O’Flanagan 1928, 87). Date of upload: 22 October 2012