Westropp — EarthworJis and Ring-walls in County Lnnerich. 477 



DUNTRILEAGUE (0. S. 49). 



A very familiar and apparently very early myth is connected with this 

 fort. Cormac Cass, son of OilioU Olom, was badly wounded in the head at 

 the battle of Knocksouna 'Samhain), west of Kilmallock,^ against Eochaidh 

 Abhraruadh. Cormac's " brain kept leaking away from him," so "they built 

 him a good Cathair at Dun ar sliabh." " The fort on the Hill '"'' at Duntriliac, 

 whence its name, " the fort of the three pillar-stones " (a fort with a closely 

 equivalent name, Lissauntrelick, remains in the district, in A ngleborough, 

 0. S. 57), for they enclosed a spring in the midst, and built over it a house, 

 with three great pillar-stones. Between these the king was placed, with his 

 head to the east, for, as in India so in Ireland, the position of the invalid 

 helped or hindered the cure. A confidential warrior constantly poured water 

 on Cormac's head, but, after a long illness, the monarch died, and was 

 " buried in a subterranean excavation in the fort."^ 1 incline to think that 

 the original redactor confused the fort below the hill and the great dolmen 

 on the top with its conspicuous trilithon. Duntrileague has no hill-fort, for 

 there is no trace round the dolmen, but so wild a legend may have easily 

 confused the minute topography, though this rarely happens. Of course its 

 author knew nothing of the Bronze Age, and in the remote past a legend of 

 the strange treatment of the wounded prince arose, and may have reached 

 him, in which Duntrileague was named, leaving liim to add his confused 

 recollection of the fort and leaba there. Even late in the last century 

 conservative antiquaries maintained that the Cloghogle dolmen at Ballina 

 was erecied in the sixth cenlury of our era, tliough ii. was not mentioned even 

 in the late and most unreliable Life of St. Cellach, on which they and 

 O'Doiiovan based this aiiaclironistic assertion.* 



Little else is told of Duntrileague. The fort was repaired by King Brian 

 about A.D. 1002-12 ; it was burned in 1054 by Gillaphadraig, Lord of Ossory, 

 son of Maelnambo, and the foreigners, and again named in 1088. A deed in 

 the Gormanston Eegister= calls it Dundirleke in 1346. The Bourke Eental 

 of 1546 claims the small quarter of Duntriliag. In 1655 it belonged to the 

 Cantwells, who sold it to Hugh Massy.'^ No trace remains of the castle and 

 fortified yards held by the Massys between the sieges of Limerick, in 1690-91. 

 A farmhouse in the valley marks the site. 



1 Near Tankardstown, an earthwork remains there, Cnoc Samhna, Knocksouna, or 

 Knocksawney in 1583, and Knockesawny, 1655- 



2 Duntrileague is certainly on the hill, but not on a summit, as one might expect from 

 the name. 



3 Agallamh (Silva Gadelica), vol. ii, p. 129. * See supra, vol. xxvii, p. 430. 

 ° p. 145 d. " Book of Distribution, p. 90. 



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