490 Proceedings of tJie Royal Irish Academy. 



his many unfounded statements in these otherwise valuable notes. I do not 

 find the very slightest trace of a fort there such as we so often find round 

 churches. The oldest records (as we see) say that the forts (at least two) 

 were on the river bank. To complete these notes (for full accounts have not 

 hitherto been published) I must very briefly give a description. The founda- 

 tions and a few feet of the east and side walls and one jamb stone with a 

 slight mounding (now set near the stile) alone remain to mark St. Mainehin's 

 Church ; the remains are rather late. 



Ballynoe Castle in the churchyard is late and of little interest, evidently 

 somewhat later than the towers of the Lower Castle. The east side is much 

 wrecked, probably by lightning. The spiral stair of fifty-eight steps is in the 

 north-east angle ; beside it were several stories, all small rooms. The west, or 

 main, section has three stories under a pointed vault, and a large upper room 

 over it. The floors rested on large beams, the ends set in the walls. There 

 are curious recesses for beams, wood panels, and a ceiling in the vaulting. 

 The windows are of the plainest pattern. Tradition says that O'Donovan's' 

 daughter threw two of her father's officers into the river, one escaping alive. 

 Probably, like the other O'Donovau legend, it is late, and certainly valueless. 

 In some cases John O'Donovan's inquiries evidently suggested too well what 

 replies he desired. 



Eagle Mount, Lissaueocha, Ballynoe. — This is a conspicuous bushy 

 mote, also called Eagle Mount and Mounteagle. It is situated on the 

 summit of the long ridge, westward from the church and castle. It 

 commands a lovely view of all the eastern county from the picturesque bold 

 mountains of Ballyhoura and the Galtees to the Slieve Phelim and Cratloe 

 Hills, the tall white spire of Kilmallock rising among the trees to the south- 

 east. The sides are thickly covered with furze and a few very old hawthorns. 

 The flat top is clear and grassy. John Windele calls it " Lassadeocha, for- 

 merly crowned by a phallus,"- for he had imbibed strange notions from his 

 predecessor in ogham research — Beauford. The Ordnance Survey Letters 

 only give that wearisome legend (like that told of the majority of forts, 

 castles, and monasteries) that a passage runs from it to Bruree fort. 



The platform measures 60 feet north and south by 69 feet east and west, 

 and is 20 feet high to the north and 23 feet to the south ; it is about 120 feet 

 in diameter at the base, and has no fosse ring or gangway. There is a 

 depression 8 feet to 10 feet wide, carefully curved, and 3 feet below the 



'Students of "perverse archseology" will remember Beauford's translation of the 

 name O'Donovau as "the fort on the river" in Vallancey's Gollectanta ! 

 2 Topography of Kerry (MSS. R. I. Acad., 12 C 16), p. 370, 



