Enclosure in Pigeonpark

In tillage. Carrigan (1905, vol. 3, 371) mentions that, ‘The old English name of this parish was Dunfert, which became corrupted into Danesfort during the 18th century. Irish speakers always call the parish Dhoon-fǎrthǎ, i.e. Dúin Fearta, Fort of the Graves …The Dún from which the name is derived is presumably the great fort, on the roadside, at Danesfort cross’. Orpen (1909, 320-21) provides an extent of lands, ‘of Joan, Countess of Gloucester and Hertford, taken in 1307, the jurors say that there are within the manor of Dunfert “Within the enclosure one hall, one chamber, one dairy, one grange, one bretage beyond the gate, and other wooden houses”. They also mention “a dovecote,” perhaps at the same spot’. He describes this monument as, ‘a very large circular fort surrounded by a deep ditch and inner bank. There are traces of a rectangular tower (?) and other buildings on the bank, and of a wall dividing the fort diametrically’. He goes on to describe the adjacent smaller enclosure (KK023-057----) which is c. 20m to the NE and continues, ‘I conjecture that this is the bretage of the Extent of 1307, and that the large outer fort, perhaps the original Dun Fearta, was utilized as the enclosure for the buildings mentioned’. A large enclosure (int. diam. c. 70m; overall diam. c. 90m) defined by a bank (Wth 8-10m; int. H 1.6m; ext. H 3.5m) and outer fosse (Wth 6-8m; D 2m). The bank rises gradually from the interior. A section of the bank (L c. 35m; Wth 7m), from S-SW, has been quarried away and the ground is slightly lower than the interior. In the NNE sector there is a section of bank (L 5m; Wth 3.5m) which is higher than the next by about 1m and has a hollow in it on the external face. In the N quadrant the fosse is wider and shallower and runs into the adjoining property. The fosse is waterlogged in the S quadrant and in the W quadrant, adjacent to the public house, it has been infilled. Immediately NE of the enclosure there is a circular pigeon house/dovecote (KK023-059----). The fosse immediately S of this has been partly filled in and the bank partly levelled to give access to the remainder of the plot, probably also filling in the well which is indicated in the fosse at this location on the OS maps. To the W of the pigeon house, in the NE sector, there is a causeway across the fosse and a gap in the bank that may be original. There is another gap to the SW which is the present access to the enclosure. The interior is relatively level and is divided into two roughly equal parts by the remnants of an old field boundary (Wth 2m; H 0.2-0.6m) running ENE-WSW. There is no mention in the field inspection (16 May 1997) of the buildings (KK023-058002-; KK023-058003-) described above by Orpen. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of upload: 18 August 2021