Clare Island Survey — History and Archaeology. 2 7 



over which, partly resting on the filling of the centre, was a course of long 

 small-ended headers, a fine example of strong bonding. The thicknesses of 

 the wall are:— Doon-Ooghaniska, 6 feet to 9 feet; Dunnagappul, 10 feet to 

 13 feet; Dun-Ooghbeg, 12 feet; Porteen, 9 feet; Cathair of Bal-Dookinelly, 

 16 feet; Dun-Kilmore, 18 feet to 19 feet; Dunnaglas, 6 feet to 7 feet; the 

 Dun-Portadoon, 6 feet to 9 feet; Dun-Ballyheer, 6 feet to 7 feet; Dun- 

 Ooghmore, 6 feet ; Caherpatrick, 4 feet ; and Dunmore-Bofin, 10 feet to 15 feet. 

 The widths of the gateways are : — Dun-Kilmore, 6 feet ; Dun-Portadoon, 

 3 feet 8 inches ; Dun-Ballyheer, 3 feet 4 inches ; Dunmore-Bofin, 6 feet 

 3 inches. 



The ring-fort becomes very rare in north-west Mayo after we leave the 

 Ballycastle valley at Dunfeeny. The cliff-forts are abundant. Taking them 

 in order, they are found at the fortified headlands of Downpatrick and 

 Dunbriste (the last now broken away from the land, as its name implies). 

 Their walls are of most beautiful masonry, but quite different from the usual 

 types. Port-Conaghra has a long, straight fosse, once stone-faced, with a dry 

 stone wall on top, now nearly all rebuilt. Cashlaunicrobin, near Glenlosseragh, 

 has the typical crescent fosse and mounds of earth protecting the neck (now 

 fallen), which led to a fine conical rock, with huts on its platform now called 

 Goat Island. Horse Island, at Bealdearg, is now only joined to the land by 

 the collapsed neck, beyond which the last remains of its dry-stone wall totter 

 on the edge of the falling bank. Dunmara, now an inaccessible shore rock, 

 before huge cliffs, seems once to have been walled, as heaps of stone are visible. 

 Dunminulla, owing to a vast land-slide at the neck, and the fall of the edges 

 of its lofty platform, now only exhibits two landward trenches, one cut in the 

 rock, and a mound, capped by a dry-stone wall. 



The once important Manor-Castle of Dookeeghan (Dumhach ui Caochain) 

 was a fenced platform, on whose narrow neck (now half fallen) a gatehouse 

 was built in the fifteenth century, outside which are faint traces of the 

 crescent-mound, and ditch of the Dun. Duncarton, while better preserved, 

 is of similar design. In the Mullet I have described Dunfiachra, Dunnamo, 

 and Porth. 1 Dunfiachra is a natural platform, its narrow neck fenced by a 

 deep fosse, with a rampart on either side. Dunnamo is a huge dry-stone 

 rampart (with the later features of cells at its gateway, like Dunbeg near 

 Ventry). The wall rests on the earthwork of an earlier cliff-fort. Outside are 

 the faint remains of an abattis, found elsewhere only at Dun Aengusa and 

 Dubh Cathair in Aran, Ballykinvarga, Co. Clare, and a few forts in other 

 countries — Cademuir and Dreva in Scotland, the demolished Castel Coz in 



1 Proc. E.I. A., vol. xxix, (c), p. 11. See also Koyal Commission on Coast Erosion, vol. iii, 

 part 2, pp. 231, 237, 241. 



