Westropp — Larger Cliff Forts of West Coast of Co. Mayo. 31 



heaped with rounded stones from the shore, nearlj' all of pure white quartz, 

 which frequently are laid ex vote on undoubted altars and on holy wells 

 elsewhere. On my asking one of the bystanders if such was the case, there 

 was some hesitation in the reply ; and at last we were told that it was 

 children put them there, and that the place was not a Christian burial- 

 ground. A basin, or " bullaun," 16 inches across in a block of brown gritstone, 

 lies near the north-west corner of the moiind, as is common in old graveyards. 

 There are hut-enclosures against the rampart to the north-west. 



At 167 feet from the ring- fort we reach a creek between the two outer 

 headlands. The neck of each is fortified. The southern, called the Dun, 

 has two fosses, with three mounds running straight across it, at 30 feet from 

 the head of the creek. The outer mound is barely traceable and 8 feet wide ; 

 the outer fosse is 9 feet to 10 feet wide and 4 feet to 5 feet deep. The 

 central mound is 16 feet wide, and appears to have had a strong fence to its 

 landward face, leaving a banquette behind. This feature occurs in better 

 preservation at Ferriter's Castle in Kerry, and the inner west mound of 

 Cahermurphy Castle in Clare. Traces also occur in Doonagap)pul on Clai-e 

 Island, which bears considerable likeness to the inner Dun of Kilmore. 

 Inside is another fosse, 16 feet wide above, and in parts 7 feet deep. It has a 

 levelled inner mound, 7 feet to 12 feet thick. 



The middle of the fosse is filled up from 42 to 71 feet from the northern 

 cliff by a hut nearly levelled, and measuring 27 feet north and south by 

 32 east and west over all, with walls, 6 to 10 feet thick. The whole work- 

 are 123 feet long, and the ends seem uninjured by the sea. There are no hut- 

 sites on the headland, off the end of which is a detached rock of equal height 

 with the Dun. 



The northern headland is called "Dangan." We were told that last 

 year (1909) the side-wall of a mortar-buUt structure of that name, with 

 several " loop-holes " in it, slipped down the north cliff. There is faint trace 

 of a wall across the neck ; then, at 138 feet from the end of the creek, is a 

 fosse, 28 feet wide at the grouud-lcA^el, 9 feet deep, and 36 feet long, to the 

 south of the gangway, which foUows the line of the ridge of the neck. All 

 to the south has perished in the landslip which, with masses of stones of the 

 overthrown buildmg, hung about 12 feet down, needing but little to start it 

 again on its journey into the sea below. 



Inside the fosse is the wall, below of dry stone (or, rather, perhaps a 

 stone-faced mound), on which rests the base of a mortar-built wall, 10 feet 

 thick, and barely 4 feet high. It was probably a medieval guardliouse, built 

 across the older works, utilizing the northern half of the fosse for a 

 basement story. 



