1893-94.] 6i 



always suggests a fortification, and is encircled by one or more 

 moats. While one class of structure was evidently raised to 

 the honour of the dead, the other as clearly was meant for the 

 protection of the living. The absence of the moat round an 

 earthen enclosure also enables us to distinguish the keels, or 

 pagan cemeteries, from the raths, while a circular enclosure 

 with a moat of trifling depth was probably only intended for 

 penning cattle. On this point, Major Wood Martin, whose 

 work on crannoges gives some weight to his opinion, divides 

 raths into three classes, and as he classes first " those for 

 penning flocks and herds at night, to protect them from wolves 

 and marauders," we may assume he considered this class the 

 most numerous, and this is an extremely probable view. The 

 inhabitants of Ireland at that time, although depending partly 

 on hunting and fishing, seem to have been mainly pastoral, 

 and as most of the country was covered by forests and morasses, 

 the natural meadows were widely scattered, so that herds of 

 cattle were frequently obliged to remain at night at consider- 

 able distances from the residence of their owners, under the 

 charge of a herd with a wolf dog or two, so that many such 

 places of safety would have been required. 



Major Wood further states, in the same work, " Prehistoric 

 Sligo" — "The raths must have been erected principally by the 

 Tuath-de-Danaans and the Milesians." As he uses these names 

 from the *' Annals of the Four Masters," he most likely accepts 

 their chronology as well, which would give to some raths an 

 antiquity of 3000 to 4000 years. These Annals mention the 

 erection of two raths in the reign of Neimidh, 2350 years 

 before Christ, and several during the reign of the early Milesian 

 kings, 1700 years before our era. But as they also mention 

 the first appearance of some of the chief rivers and lakes of 

 Ireland in the same reigns, which we know to be impossible, 

 their evidence is too much vitiated to be relied on. When we 

 consult other authorities on Irish antiquities, we are surprised 

 lo find that although they treat exhaustively of burial tumuli 

 and crannoges, or artificial islands, they scarcely refer to raths 



