Westropp — Types of the Ring-forts of Eastern Co. Clare. 73 



cannot certainly identify it with the caher, though this is probable. When I 

 saw it in 1895, much of the west segment stood about 5 feet high and thick, 

 and 4 feet high to the north-west and north. The base was of earth, and 

 stone-faced like Cloon's Fort, with large blocks set on edge, usually 3 feet long 

 and high, and 12 inches to 18 inches thick ; some to the east are 4 feet 6 inches, 

 5 feet 2 inches, and 6 feet long, and 3 feet 6 inches high ; the longest to the 

 west is 5 feet 8 inches long. The wall is usually 6 feet 6 inches thick eastward, 

 the garth 75 feet north and south by 69 feet east and west. On my first visit 

 I noted a gate as facing the south-east. I found no trace in 1912. In 1895 

 a curious feature existed in a course of blocks, set like books on a shelf above 

 the large bottom plinth. I have only seen this arrangement in two forts in 

 Barren, one being Caheraclarig, near Lemaneagh. All is now gone ; but I have 

 a sketch taken in 1895. 



Eastward, towards the road, is an earthen fort stone-faced for 5 feet up 

 the top of dry masonry, 4 feet high and 9 feet thick. It is 99 feet across inside ; 

 the south edge of the wall is cut off by a modern ditch and fence. In the centre 

 is a house-foundation, with two circular cells, the western partly gone ; the 

 intervening wall 12 feet thick ; the outer 6 feet ; the eastern cell is 12 feet 

 inside; it lies 48 feet from the west, and is 24 feet over all. 



Three earthen forts lie between it and Olooney — one on Crow Hill or 

 Knockaphreagaun to the east. It and Lissana fort have rings, 4 to 6 feet high. 

 Knocknafeany fort is barely 70 feet across ; the mounds 3 feet to 5 feet high ; 

 neither of the last has a fosse. Eeaskreagh Fort was defaced when I 

 examined it twenty years ago ; and it is now nearly quite levelled ; it lies in 

 Sraheen. 



The five pillars on " Knocknafearbrioga " Hill are supposed to be the seven 

 robbers of St. Mochulla's Bull, petrified by the curse of the saint ; they have 

 been described in these pages ; they lie about 500 yards from Carrahan Caher. 

 Fomerla has remains of a castle, two small cists, a " killeen " graveyard, with 

 a basin-stone, and an earthen ring-fort, tt feet high, without a fosse. All these 

 forts are ringed with fine hawthorns, and pink thorns abound in Fomerla. 



Curraghmooghaun. — Close to Castletown Lake, and not far from Caher- 

 shaughnessy, rises a low hill, with dense thickets on its western flank, and 

 commanding a wide outlook to the Shannon and the Fergus, and far up to the 

 Burren mountains, of terraced limestone. On the summit is a most problema- 

 tical earthwork, a circular fort 90 feet across, which once had a dry-stone 

 rampart ; the fosse is 5 feet to 6 feet deep, the inner fort 9 feet above its 

 bottom. Outside at 10 feet to 15 feet away is an outer ring 5 feet high, lost 

 in a thicket of bramble, ash, and hazel. South from the first fort runs a 

 strange loop, C-shaped in plan, with mounds 5 feet high, and 10 feet to 12 



R.I.A. PROC, VOL. XXXII, SECT C. [11] 



