2 60 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



Dcxmore or Duxkeex (0. S.. 9 b). — Though not the largest of the forts. 

 the strongest is certainly Dun more. The size implied by the name may be 

 in contrast to Diuigrania, the Dooneen, or to the house-ring, not far to the east 

 of it. As such names are rarely true proper names, that of the Dun was 

 more likely Dimkeen, the pleasant fort, as that name attaches to the cliff 

 beside it. The Irish, alone of early nations, appear to have loved picturesque 

 wild scenery, and to have embodied their delight in place-names, such as 

 Ardeevin, Dromkeen, and such names. This phase of character has not died 

 out among the peasantry, and I have often admired the unaffected, artistic 

 pleasure of fishermen and herdsmen in scenery, and their sense of the poetical 

 in nature. 



In fortifying the great hill that juts out so boldly into the Sound of 

 Shark, the builders secured an important outlook. From its summit, nay, 

 even from its rampart, they overlooked Inishark, and away over endless reefs 

 and islets to the walled mass of Ardoilean, 1 along the low shores and lofty 

 peaks of Connemara, to the south and east, to Slyne Head and Cleggan, and 

 northward to Achill. 



The maps of 1839 show a long, straight rampart, from the southern cliff 

 half-way across the headland ; but O'Donovan was told by John iloran (an 

 inhabitant of Bofin, on whom he had to rely for information, as he could not 

 visit the island)/ that " there was a fort in "West Quarter, called Dun Mor, 

 which was of earth, but is now just effaced.'' Dr. Browne repeated this from 

 the Ordnance Survey Letters, without comment or marking its source, so till 

 I noticed the early origin of the statement I was misled into supposing that 

 the works shown on the map had been levelled just before his visit. This 

 was borne out by the new Survey marking no works, but "site of," at 

 Dunmore. It is indeed surprising, in face of this apparently unequivocal 

 evidence, to have to record that the fort is still extant, though defaced, its 

 plan, and even features, being still intelligible, and its ruin visible and well 

 marked, even as far off as the Harbour; that it is not an earthwork, but a 

 dry-stone wall ; and that it is not straight, but boldly curved. This clearly 

 shows the grievous wrong done to Irish studies by the parsimony of the 

 Survey in providing no competent persons to oversee the marking of 

 antiquities, which the new maps purported to give. I make this strong state- 

 ment, not to reflect on the surveyor's, who were not antiquaries, but to point 

 out to students of Irish archaeology how little deductions, based merely 



1 For tiie antiquities of High Island we have a note by G. II. Kinahan, Journal Roy. Soc. 

 Ant. Ir., vol. x, p. 348, and a careful description bv E. A. S. Macalister, ibid., vol. xxvi, 

 p. 197. 



; Ordnance Survey Letters, Mayo, vol. i, p. 484. 



