Browne — Ethnography of the Mullet^ Inishkeay 8f Fortacloy. 641 



is perfect, that overhanging the sea on the south side. Where the 

 original wall-face shows it is like the forts of Aran, composed of 

 blocks of stone, fitted neatly together without mortar ; it is about ten 

 feet high and eight feet in thickness. The ground in front of the 

 wall was originally provided with a fosse and a wide belt of stone- 

 stakes fixed upright in the earth, as in Dun ^ngus on Inishmore, 

 Aran ; but all of these, with the exception of a few stumps, have now 

 disappeared. A full description of this fort is given by O'Donovan 

 in his MS. letters to the Ordnance Survey. The name of this fort, 

 Dunnamoe, is now believed by the people to be Bun-na-mho, or the 

 fort of the cows, a name, the origin of which is stated in a ms. letter^ 

 by a Mr. Owen Heenaghan, of Emlybeg, in the Mullet, dated May, 1821. 

 to be explained by the local tradition, that the cattle of the people 

 were kept there at the time of the battle at Cross, to be afterwards 

 referred to. O'Donovan, however, believed it to have been originally 

 named Z>w?z Modha, after Modha, a chief of the Clann Huamore, Belgae, 

 who also gave his name to Inis Modha, or the Clew Bay Islands. 



The other forts are Dun Fiachra, which consists of an earthen 

 wall across the narrowest part of the neck of a long narrow pen- 

 insula, with precipitous coast, situated in the townland of Aghadoon ; 

 the remains of a stone doon, " Spinkadoon," of somewhat larger 

 area, are situated a short distance to the north of this fort. 

 Bunadearg, the fort of the red man, is also situated on the west 

 coast of the Mullet. Forth, an earthen dun situated near the rectory, 

 is barely traceable. Bunavinalla, a large fort, stands on a rocky 

 height just outside the inlet of Portacloy. 



There are several monuments of early date, the most remarkable 

 of which is Zeacht var JErris, the monument of the slaughter of 

 Erris, near Cross, traditionally said to mark the sepulchre of a King 

 of Munster, who was slain there in a battle with the people of 

 Connaught. It is an irregularly pyramidal cairn, about fifteen feet 

 in height ; it lies within the remains of a nearly circular entrench- 

 ment ; there are several such cairns in the neighbourhood, one of 

 which, on being opened, was found to contain the skeleton of a man 

 buried in the upright position. Leacht var Erris was for a long time 

 buried beneath the sandhills, though its name and situation, and the 

 history of the battle were still remembered by the people; but one 

 night early in the present century a great storm blew off the sand 



1 This letter is pasted inside the cover of a copy of Knight's "Enis" in the 

 Library of the Eoyal Irish Academy. 



