Fairy fort / earthen ringfort in Beltacken

Situated at the W-end of a natural ridge running E-W, in undulating pasture with extensive views in all directions. Monument is now visible as a roughly circular-shaped tree-covered enclosure on Digital Globe aerial photography. Depicted on the 1837 ed. OS 6-inch map as a circular-shaped enclosure. Shown as a roughly oval-shaped earthwork on the revised 1913 ed. OS 25-inch map. Described in 1980 as an irregular, roughly oval-shaped area (22.5m E-W; 18m N-S) enclosed by an inner bank which is reduced to a scarp and having a deep intervening fosse, a low outer bank reduced to a scarp in places and a causewayed entrance at SE. The inner bank of earth and stone is best preserved from E-ENE and is very faint elsewhere, being reduced to a narrow, partially grass-covered stone wall footings from SSE-S-W. The intervening fosse has a deep U-shape in section and is much shallower at SE, possibly due to the natural ridge extending beyond the site to ESE and SE. The outer bank of earth and stone is well preserved with traces of internal stone facing at E. There is a causewayed entrance at SE where there is a gap (Wth 2.4m) in the inner bank and a corresponding gap (Wth 2.8m) in the outer bank and a causeway (Wth 4m; H 0.7m) across the fosse. The outer bank has a modern gap at NE and another at NW. The interior is level & featureless. Later field banks extend from the exterior of the outer bank at W and NW, where they form a small triangular enclosure abutting the outer bank, as visible on Digital Globe aerial photography. There is a modern, curvilinear field fence running roughly E-W just outside the external bank at S. Compiled by: Alison McQueen, Vera Rahilly and Caimin O’Brien Date of upload: 13 December 2018