( 267 ) 



XV. 



''THE ANCIENT FORTS OF IRELAND." BEING SOME 

 FURTHER NOTES ON A PAPER OF THAT NAME, 

 ESPECIALLY AS TO THE AGE OF MOTES IN 

 IRELAND. 



By THOMAS JOHNSON WESTROPP, M.A. 



Read November 30, 1903. Published January 23, 1904. 



When I laid before the Academy a Paper^ on the extensive and as 

 yet most imperfectly known subject of the ancient forts of Ireland 

 I was well aware of the many limitations of my work. I was also 

 prepared for the detection of many errors in its pages, and have been 

 the more agreeably surprised at the consideration it has received from 

 other antiquaries. I would confine this paper to giving certain cor- 

 rigenda and addenda of my own had not one criticism been published, 

 which, though friendly, a:ffeets not the details, but the broad deduc- 

 tions of one section of my paper. I wish therefore to reply to this 

 one point, lest my silence should be misinterpreted ; for I believe the 

 following facts will justify and bear out my views in the above- 

 mentioned paper. 



It has been stated that, from being unacquainted with an essay by 

 a certain English antiquary, I have adopted the view of the pre- 

 Norman and, in some cases, prehistoric origin of Irish motes, the fact 

 being (it is alleged) that they are confined to the English Pale and 

 were only of Norman origin. 



First, to avoid error — for the word " mote" or " moate " is 

 sometimes applied by Irish antiquaries to the low rath or liss — I use 

 the word " mote" exclusively for the high flat-topped " mount," with 

 or without a lower side-platform or "bailey," and girt with one or 

 more rings and fosses. "When without the base court, I use the term 

 "simple mote"; otherwise, the term "complex mote."^ 



' Trans. E. L A., xxxi., p. 579. I have also dealt with the mote question in 

 a paper read November, 1902, before the R. S. A. I. 



2 As only one Thing mote is recorded at any of the Danish settlements, I do 

 not deal with any but the residential moles in this paper. 



B.I. A. PROC, VOL. XXIV., SEC. c] [-1] 



