What is recorded here

Indicated is a circular fairy fort on the highest point of a Mayo ridge, offering unbroken views toward the Ox Mountains and Lough Brohly. Its sod-covered stone bank still stands beside later field walls, marking a place where human hands shaped the land before forgetting its name. Another rath glints two hundred metres away, suggesting the ridge once belonged to neighbours rather than solitude.

In pasture, straddling the highest point on a small NE−SW ridge, which provides extensive views in all directions, with a stream 100m to NW, Lough Brohly 700m to SW, and the rising slopes of the Ox Mountains to E. The surrounding terrain is a mix of pasture, broken by rocky outcrops, and expanses of bog. Slightly raised circular area (48.5m N−S; 48.6m E−W) defined by a sod-covered stone bank (Wth 2.2m; int. H 0.3m at NW, 0.8m at NE; ext. H 1.5m at NW, 1.2 at NE). The rath has been incorporated into a system of later field walls: the stone bank is topped with a later field wall (Wth 0.8-1m), and field walls radiate from it to NW, SE, S and SW. The interior has a gentle slope down from centre to S−SE. Current access is through a gap (Wth 1.6m) in the stone bank at SSW, flanked on the W side by a later field wall, but it is not clear if this is an original entrance. A partly stone-faced scarp (H 1.5m at W) curves around the rath at SSW−WNW. It merges with the rath perimeter at SSW but arcs out to a distance of 5-6m from the stone bank at WNW. It is possible that it incorporates remnants of an outer enclosing bank, but it may simply be a relatively recent scarping of the natural ridge slope. Clumps of blackthorn and brambles ring the perimeter. Another rath (MA040-062) is located 200m to NE on the same ridge top---- ridge, and is visible from this one. Compiled by: Jane O’Shaughnessy Date of upload: 8 June 2020

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