Kank — The Dun of Drumsna. 325 



appears to indicate that in ancient days the water-ways were deeper, and 

 more formidable obstacles to the traveller, than they are at present. Where 

 a river intervened, as Dr. Joyce has pointed out, the most suitable crossing- 

 places were well known, and a deep ford was called "snamh" (snave) or 

 " swimming-place." The village of Drumsna in the Co. Leitrim thus derives 

 its name, and in the "Post-chaise Companion," published about the year 1800, 

 is given as " Drumsnave," which well preserved the old Irish designation ; 

 and its position on the bank of the Shannon marks the locality where the 

 river was known to be fordable by wading or swimming according to the 

 volume of the water passing down at the season of the year. 



The great river, with Lough Allen at its head, constitutes a natural 

 frontier of about thirty miles in length as far as Eoosky, between ancient 

 Ulster and Connaught, and must have been impassable except at this place 

 to a hosting in prehistoric times. From Carrick-on-Shannon it rolls its slow, 

 deep flood easterly till it reaches Jamestown, where it diverges at right angles 

 to the north, and, describing a narrow loop, encircles the present demesne of 

 Sir Gilbert King, Bart., of Charlestown, and returns south again to within a 

 mile of the point of departure, forming a peninsula, and here at Drumsna 

 again reverts to its easterly course, expanding into broad lagoons and the 

 lake-like expanses of Lough Boderg. This peninsula of Roscommon, so formed 

 by the loop of the river, is accessible by wading from the Leitrim bank (except 

 at time of floods), at the falls where the bed of the river changes its level, 

 and at other places by swimming or wading when the river is low. Across 

 the neck of this peninsula accordingly we find a massive earth-work has been 

 raised with a steep slope facing Leitrim, and a gentler one on the Koscommon 

 side, which stretches for a mile from one bend of the Shannon to the other ; 

 then turns and follows the elbow of the stream for about another 1200 feet 

 to the mouth of the modern canal. Thence, bordering the banks up stream for 

 5000 feet (just 93 yards short of a mile), a series of lesser subsidiary earth- 

 works stretch, which are proportionally of larger size opposite any shallow 

 reaches of the river. Though in portions much defaced and levelled by the 

 farmer, all the salient features of construction are readily perceptible to an 

 antiquary. No traditions, however, seem to have survived as to its origin. 

 Its local name, " the dun," gives no clue except that it was a defensive work, 

 reminding one of those at Granard called Duncladh, the fortified ditch. The 

 surrounding country on both sides of the Shannon was wasted by war for 

 long periods of time, which culminated in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when 

 the native owners were expatriated from their patrimony, and the common 

 people extirpated under the cruel rule of Sir Charles Coote, Governor of 

 Connaught. In connexion with this I am told that old people remember the 



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