Divelliug Places of Prehistoric Man 59 



now known as Phil's Fort near Dromore, I had quite independently 

 studied this fort and its very peculiar surroundings, and arrived 

 at the same conclusions in the main as he did. Briefly they 

 amount to the following. 



The rath is a large one, with double fosses and ramparts 

 about 30 feet from the bottom to the top of the steep ramparts, all 

 enclosing a central flat topped mound of about 100 feet diameter 

 at the top. The main peculiarity of the fort however lies in the 

 fact that the trenches and ramparts only extend about two-thirds 

 of the way round in crescent form. Protection on the now exposed 

 side was undoubtedly secured by the presence of a now non-existant 

 lake the former existence of which is perfectly evident. The site of 

 the lake is now occupied by vast flat meadows extending eastward to 

 the narrowing at a point now crossed by the old bridge of Dromore, 

 on the main road from Belfast to Dublin. On this flat meadow 

 close to Phil's Fort are two prehistoric burial sites, the remains of a 

 cairn enclosing a cist, and close to it the remains of a stone circle. 

 In both of these human remains were found. These types of 

 human burial monuments we must agree belong to a period let us 

 say at least 1500 years old, possibly much more. Now the fort 

 was built when the lake existed ; the burial remains must naturally 

 date from a period when the lake site was dry. Mr. Dickson and 

 I, quite without each other's knowledge came to the same 

 conclusion, namely that the fort was erected when the lake was 

 existant ; that at some unknown period later the lake was drained, 

 leaving the fort exposed and therefore useless and out of date ; that 

 at a later period still, how nmch later we do not know, the 

 monuments, at least 1500 years old, were erected, and that therefore 

 the fort was even of earlier date, probably 2000 years or more. 

 The evidence seemed incontrovertable. It was only after frequent 

 visits to the place, and careful comparison of it with the Ordnance 

 map, that another solution of the puzzle presented itself to rne, and 

 while giving Mr. Dickson all credit for his well written and well 

 thought out paper, I feel more than convinced that the conclusion 

 that he came to, and that later on I myself quite independently 

 arrived at, is not correct. If one proceeds westward alon^ the 



