27 | May | 2014 | Nigel Borrington

Pagan ring forts and passage tombs , From Kerry to kilkenny

Knockroe passage tomb, county Kilkenny
Irish landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington

Pagan ring forts and passage tombs , From Kerry to kilkenny

During July last year 2013, I visited two ring forts near Cahersiveen, County Kerry and posted on them as below :

Cahergall ring fort is a massive stone construction, built between 400BC and 500AD, It can be found close to Cahersiveen, County Kerry. Leacanabuaile feels very much more like a dwelling place for people to both live and keep themselves safe from the surrounding Environment. This included raiders and wild animals stealing cattle.

Leacanabuaile, stone ring Fort

Sitting on a hill side near Cahersiveen in County Kerry is Leacanabuaile Stone Fort, it is considered one of the best examples of an Irish ring fort.

The name translates to ‘Hillside of the Summer Pasturage’.

Returning home

The visit to both these locations was one of the most interesting history trips I have ever done and left me with a great sense of the History of Europe and of the people who lived here before Christian times.

On returning to county Kilkenny I fell like I was living in a place with a much more limited sense of history, Tipperary and Kilkenny feel much less remote than the coast line and mountains of county Kerry and their history seems to be much more modern.

Well it has taken me almost a year since the visit to Cahergall and Leacanabuaile to realise that this impression of my local area is far from true. Apart from the location of Knockroe (Post here), I have started to visit and find more and more local remains of Ireland’s past and it clearly goes way beyond the days of St Patrick and the early church.

The images below are satellite images of many passage tombs and ring forts, within 10km of our home :

Finding these locations was a real eye opener and showed to me that these forts and passage tombs must have been located through out the country.

The forts in Kerry have been restored over the last 5 years and may well have been in the same poor condition as the local ones here.

It is more than likely that the stone from these locations has been used in more modern times to build local Churches, Farms and stone walls on farm land, Yesterday I posted on the high cross at Kilkamerry and talked about this re-use of Pagan sites to build Christian locations.

It is very likely then that current church yards and grave yards have also been constructed on more of these sites, many more circular features exist on the local landscape and are possibly also ring forts but for these ones time has made things a little less clear.

What does becomes clear from looking deeper is that the pagan history of Ireland was extensive and that the pre-Christian population of this Island was as big as any other location on the European continent.

The images here are of the tomb or ring fort on Ballinlinagh hill, county Kilkenny and of the passage tomb of Knockroe :

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