372 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, 



for the founders of the peel-towers lived mainly in the fifteenth century ;^ and 

 the tribe did not even retain the captured Norman castle of Quin, but gave it 

 to the peaceful monks of St. Francis to use as a convent. 



In the district we may note that there are no remains of prehistoric 

 villages, or of any enclosures — primitive towns — like Moghane, and perhaps 

 Turlough Hill fort; there are three forts of the flat-topped mote type, 

 but none of great height. Most of the forts have garths practically level 

 with the field, or, at most, slightly terraced up like the saddle-backed 

 Knockadoon, or the rath of Oreevaghmore, the latter having beside it on the 

 summit of the slope, a stone fort like a citadel, and evidently the earlier of 

 the two, as the lower earth-work runs down the slope, and is adapted to the 

 caher. Forts entirely of stone occur rather on the plains than on the hills.^ 

 No earthen forts of two or more rings occur; but the side annexe is not unknown. 

 In at least one instance (Tyredagh) the very small ring is found ; but whether 

 sepulchral or the ring of a single circular house requires excavation to set at 

 rest, for (in our present knowledge) there are no external characteristics to 

 mark off the sepulchral from the residential ; and Irish literature shows us 

 several examples of earth-works used for both, and indeed other, purposes, 

 such as outlook and ceremonial. The stone -fort is very abundant ; we find 

 a noble triple-ringed example at Cahercalla, a more massive and larger two- 

 ringed fort at Oahershaughnessy, one in an earthen fort at Caherhurley, and 

 a number of simple cahers. None of the forts have steps or terraces; the 

 wall in all cases I have seen is single, battered, and with upright joints. 

 The gates are always defaced ; but in three instances, Langough, Oaherbane, 

 and Caherloghan, the foundations can be measured, and show the normal 

 types, two being of coursed masonry and one with gate-posts, the lintels in 

 all cases being removed.^ One very remarkable and anomalous enclosure, 

 the " Dooneen," or Caher, of Ballydonohan, is brought for the first time to 

 notice. It is essentially a promontory-fort in a marsh, which may have been 

 a lake when the fort was built, to judge from the former existence of a cause- 

 way. Several souterrains occur in the forts, whether earthen or of stone, 

 given here. One blank is noticeable, that of the square earthen-fort. It is 

 not entirely absent, but nothing unequivocal, nothing like the square earthen 



1 The Castle Founders List gives Rossroe Castle as built about 1390-1400. A group of castles, 

 including Lismeehan, about l-iSO, and the bulk between 1450 and 1490, but several towers were 

 built by King Torlough O'Brien at the close of the thirteenth century. 



- Probably because the low hills are of drift, not crag, while the high hills were covered with 

 dense forests. The drift, however, is full of blocks of limestone, sandstone, conglomerate, and even 

 granite, so a stone wall or stone-faced mound could have been made from material gathered on the 

 spot. 



^ The opes of the gates are from 3 to 4 feet 7 inches wide. 



