By thomas johnson westropp, M. A
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- Bu səhifədəki naviqasiya:
- Cathair Murchadha
- Forts near
- Leagard
2 Ibid., April, 1637, P. R. O. I.
5 Depositions in Library of Trinity College, Dublin; see also Canon Dwyer’s “Diocese of Killaloe, ” pp. 211, 214; James Frost, “History of County Clare,” pp. 358-9, and Journal Limerick Field Club, vol. iii, pp. 3, 5. 6 P. R. 0. I., Co. Clare, p. 351. 124 ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND. alias Cahirmore, Kiltumper, Lack, and Leitrim, in Kilmichill parish, in Clondrala barony.1 As to the burial-places of the Mac Gormans—Donn, in 1626, Mahon, in 1665, and Melachlin, in 1709, were buried at Kilmacduan church, but I saw no old tombstones there; it was probably the ancestral cemetery. Thomas, son of this Melachlin, built, in about 1735, the chapel2 or burial enclosure at the east end of Coad (Comhadh) church, probably because his wife, Alice O’Dempsy, was of an Inchiquin family. Dermot, son of Melachlin, held Cathair Murchada; then Daniel MacGorman was owner, 1594 to 1620. He left three sons, Conor, Melachlin, and Caher. Another Daniel and his son held it in 1641; but it was confiscated after the Civil War, and granted to Lord Clare. When that noble’s descendant would not desert King James, it was again confiscated in 1688, and sold to Francis Burton, Charles Mac Donnell, and Nicholas Westby. The lands of Drimelihy were held along with it by the Mac Gormans, and they continued to live on that townland. In August, 1753, Silvester, son and heir of Dermot Gorman, leased his share of the latter townland to John Westropp, of Lismehane, for the life of Thomas Gorman. The lessee’s grandson, Ralph Westropp, of Limerick, and others, in 1809, after the death of Thomas the Chevalier O’Gorman, when the lands fell out of lease, purchased Drimelihy, and effected the curious partition deed that split Drimelihy into the strange long strips now bearing the names of the purchasers: Drimelihy-Burton, -Westby, -Macdonnell, and -Westropp, in 1813.3 The Chevalier will always be remembered as an indefatigable (if not very reliable) antiquary and genealogist,4 being compiler of most of the pedigrees of the native families in Clare towards the close of the eighteenth century.5 Other history of Cahermurphy is nearly lacking. The Castle-founders’ list attributes it to “Murrough, Mac Fergus, Mac Con;” but his identity and date are unknown. In 1600, the great army of Hugh O’Donnell swept up to the castle of Cathair Murchadha; but, us usual, it made no assault on the stronghold, and only gathered up the cattle spoils of the district.6
6 Annals of the Four Masters. CAHERMURPHY CASTLE AND ITS EARTHWORKS 125 The Castle. Cahermurphy Castle1 lies on the southern slope of a low ridge in the middle of a broad, marshy valley. The only early description of it that has been noted is the brief mention of the hall, courtyard, and two bedchambers, in the Castle of Cahermurphy, in Scanlan Mac Gorman’s settlement of October, 1623.2 It is in the parish, and not far north from the village, of Kilmihil, in Clonderalaw barony, being 7 miles from the Atlantic coast and 8 miles north from Clonderalaw Bay on the Shannon. It is near a little stream running westward through Cahermurphy Lake, which, under the names of the Creegh River, and eventually of the “Skivileen,” reaches the Atlantic at Rayoganagh, close to Dunbeg. The valley was evidently a large, shallow lake when the castle earthworks were dug. Perhaps it is the “Monemore” (great marsh) which, with its “castellum” (? earth fort), was held by the chief, Murchad, from King Donaldmore O’Brien, after 1172.3 The situation was very badly chosen. Had it been placed a few hundred feet to the north on the summit of the ridge, it would have dominated the whole valley, and overlooked the country beyond it in several directions.. Entrenchments, even if less elaborate than the existing ones, might have joined it to the marsh or lake and made it very strong. Instead of this, the designers dug unusually strong earthworks to either end of a steep, wet slope. They joined these with a mound and fosse of little strength along the hillside, so overhung that one can overlook the works from close beside the fosse, and an enemy coming over the ridge, even by daylight, could have assailed and probably crossed the defences a few minutes after coming in sight of the fort. The capture of the weak north-west corner put the really great and strong western works at the mercy of an assailaut, for the highest ends were joined, and were dominated by a platform only 8 feet high outside. The garth certainly did not justify the sacrifice of the higher position, as it is steep and very wet. The only strong feature, that of access to the marshy lake, could have been attained at less cost, as we noted. The marsh was, however, an efficient defence, and justified the absence of a rampart along it, for, even still, the fields from the foot of the earthwork are in parts dangerously marshy, and are everywhere intersected by small streams and pools. “Far through the marish green and still, the tangled water courses slept,” and, like those in the poem, are “shot over with purple, green, and yellow” from the iris, loosestrife, and other marsh plants. The earthwork is, in plan, shaped like a round-ended shield, with its square head to the west. It is defended on that side by two strong
Journ R.S.A.I. :Vol 1, 6th series Vol. xii, Consec Ser CAHERMURPHY CASTLE AND ITS EARTHWORKS 127 parallel mounds, about 167 feet long, running down the hill in straight lines, N.N.E. and S.S.W. by compass, with fosses outside and between; the slope is about 1 in 12; the southern ends run into the marsh. Taking them in order from the outside, there are—a fosse 10 feet wide and 4 to 5 feet deep; a mound 24 feet thick at the base and 6 feet on top, rising 11 feet over the outer and 9 feet over the inner ditch; a fosse, wet like the outer one from a water-flow under the upper earthwork; it is only 6 feet to 8 feet wide at the bottom; a parallel inner mound 18 feet to 26 feet thick at the base, and 9 feet on top, where there appears to have been a breastwork; it also is 11 feet high over the middle fosse, and 9 feet over the inner one, being a couple of feet higher than the outer mound. The entrance through these mounds lies 50 feet from the northern earthwork; the inner “fosse,” or rather drain, east of the inner mound, is only deep for the southern part.
From the north-west end of the mounds another rampart runs at right angles eastward. It has a fosse outside 5 feet deep and 12 feet wide; an old laneway runs through it. The mound, if we except a possibly modern fence 3 feet high along its summit, is only 5 feet over the fosse and 10 feet over the western ditches; to the west it is 8 feet or 9 feet higher than the upper end of the garth. It is terraced between the ends of the western mounds, and slightly higher than the outer end. It is fairly perfect for about 135 feet from the cross-mounds, and is then entirely levelled for some distance; its continuation to the east will be described. It is 25 feet to 27 feet wide at the base, and 8 feet to 10 feet on top, parts being overgrown with bushes. At 72 feet from the west mound a parallel fosse runs down the slope of the garth; it had low mounds to either side, which are much levelled, and its upper reach nearly filled up, but water flows down it from the hill. It is about 25 feet wide, and in the lower reach over 5 feet deep. The garth is thus divided in halves, the western of which again is separated by a terrace into two parts, the upper ward a square of 63 feet ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND
128 clear. The terrace for about half its length (33 feet) is steep and 12 feet high; it has been levelled to a gentler slope eastward. The lower ward is 69 feet east and west by 84 feet north and south. It is terraced up about 5 feet over the marsh, and has the foundation of a house 18 feet from its west side, hardly a foot high, and measuring 57 feet north and south by 24 feet wide. It has a small walled pit, like a well, but perhaps a garderobe, at its south-west corner; the walls are 6 feet thick. The Peel-Tower, Cahermurphy The eastern court is, roughly speaking, 114 feet east and west by 159 feet north and south, but it is irregular. The south edge (a low terrace between 5 feet and 6 feet high) bends near the fosse, and the east end is rounded. The upper part is now absolute marsh—hard to cross after wet weather. There are the foundations of a house at its north-west corner, and a less regular enclosure to the north-east. In the centre of the ward, at 50 feet from the east mound, is a semicircular terrace closely resembling the “terraced-up hill forts” of eastern Clare, near Tulla and Bodyke.1 In its centre, at 33 feet from the southern edge, is a fragment of the peel tower 23 feet long; the wall is 5 feet 3 inches thick; the north-west corner remains, and the recess of the porter’s lodge to the north-west shows that the stairs were to the south-west, and that the door faced nearly north-west, as the axis lies differently from that of the 1 Proc. R.I.A. xxvii (c), p.383. CAHERMURPHY CASTLE AND ITS EARTHWORKS 129 earthwork. The north wall of the under vault has a plain ambry at its eastern end, still entire, but that end is rapidly crumbling away. Some had fallen shortly before my last visit in September, 1910. Over the vault were at least two stories with floors; but, since I sketched the ruin in 1903, much of this upper part has fallen, some in the recent wet summer. There seem faint traces of the foundation and north-east angle; if actually of the last, the peel-tower was only 38 feet long, but the breadth is nowhere recoverable. The destruction is attributable to the poor masonry and bad, soft mortar, with too little lime, so general in the castles along the shale districts, though less frequent in the churches. The tower ought, for defensive purposes, to have been built at the northwest angle of the earthwork. The eastern mounds are similar to the western in number and character, but are lower and laid in concentric semicircles. They are 6 feet to 7 feet high, the middle one 12 feet wide on top and 25 feet thick at the base; the fosses 6 feet to 9 feet wide in the bottom and 12 feet to 14 feet or 15 feet wide above. There are only slight traces to suggest that there was any outer ring, and the inner is rarely over 2 or 3 feet high; it is 6 feet thick. All the banks are steep, often 1 in 1 or 1 in 2, and greatly covered with sallows and furze bushes; both fosses have streams running down them. The work is unique in Clare, and only for its sloping site is closely similar in plan to certain early Norman earthworks, with a square bailey and low mote “castle.” It may have been laid out by the MacGormans from their recollection of some such structure in Leinster. The whole enclosure measures about 346 feet over all (or 290 feet east and west inside) by 214 feet north and south at the west, 219 feet in the centre fosse, and 186 feet at the tower; the whole an enigma of unsparing labour and inefficient design. On the hilltop to the north-west is a small circular house-ring, 45 feet inside, with mounds 8 to 10 feet thick and little over 5 feet high, displaying many traces of stone facing. Cathair Murchadha Stone Fort (0. S. 48). Cahermurphy takes its name from the strong dry-stone ring-wall of Cathair murchadha,1 in a commanding position at the northern end of the valley on a steep green hill, one of the outposts of the plateau from Mount Callan, southward where Doolough lies. Passing over the moorland, by the road past Doolough House, we cross the high boggy ridge called Gortaneera, 580 feet above the sea, and as we near its southern slope reach a spot commanding a wide view over nearly all the Irrus or southwestern extremity of Clare. The silver thread of Moyasta creek on the Shannon, the rounded hills of Rehy, Cahercrochaun, and Moveen near 1 Described (but not illustrated) by me in Journal Limerick Field Club, vol. ii, p. 254. Col. O'Callaghan Westropp made an independent plan identical with mine. 130 ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND Loop Head, the “tumbled mass of heathery hills” of Moyarta and Clonderlaw, the high cliffs of Bealard, and the long reach of low coast Plan, Cahermurphy Fort, and Sections at Castle. with Inniscaorach, fringed with silver foam, in the midst of the sea, and on clear days the huge Corcaguiny Mountains, Slieve Mish, Caherconree, CAHERMURPHY CASTLE AND ITS EARTHWORKS 131 and Brandon, faintly blue to the south. Lanes and roads, rich in bramble and woodbine, lead down to the valley, and, beside us, on a round green bastion, is the grey circle of the cathair. The fort is almost circular in plan, 110 feet across the garth, the rampart, for most of its extent, being perfect, save to the north-east, where its former gateway and a reach of wall to either side were levelled. The rampart is a typical structure, being built in two sections : the inner is from 4 feet 4 inches to 6 feet 6 inches thick, and was probably a terrace; the outer is 13 feet thick, the whole from 17 feet 6 inches to 19 feet 6 inches thick. It is 6 feet 9 inches high to the west and 9 feet 6 inches to the south and south-east above the talus of fallen stones, being actually 11 feet 6 inches high outside and 7 feet inside. The masonry, though of rather small flags, is a model of dry-stone work,
though its materials are so thin that I counted twenty-four courses where the wall is 9 feet 6 inches high at the point shown in the photograph. To give greater strength to the mass of small stones the builders used the utmost care in fitting them into a very close-jointed smooth facing with a regular curve and a straight batter of 1 in 4, not unprecedented, but unusual in forts of larger material. The sections have apparently got each two faces; the filling is large, and roughly, but carefully, laid; the whole an excellent piece of good masonry; there are no huts or traverses inside. 132 ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND At the foot of the hill is a ring-fort, a circular platform, raised a few feet higher than the field. It is named Lisbaun, and is used as a burial- ground, and defaced by a modern wall. The names of forts in this district may be given here. Cathair names:—Cahercanavaun, Caherard, Caherrush, and Caherogan. The first is said to be called from the bog cotton, as it lies in low fields near a stream; but Canavan, white head, may be a person’s name, as with Caherogan. Caherard is a place on the high flank of Callan and Caherrush on the point of land opposite Spanish Point. Liss names:—Lissanure, Liscahan (from the Keans or O’Cathains), Lisballard, and Lissaltha, all near Miltown and (save the last) in Kilfarboy; Lisclonroe, Lissykeathy, Lisnadullaun (levelled), Lisnacloonagh, Lissyneillan, and Lisconry, all in Kilmurry and near Tromra; Lisnahoanshee, Knockalassa, Lisbaun, Lissatuan, Reanalassa, and Lissycrereen, near Knockalough, with two forts named Lisnaleagaun, one near Cahermurphy Castle, the other near the pillar-stones (between Kilmihil and Cahercanavaun), from which it takes its name. These pillars are in Termonroe, and probably marked the bounds of St. Senan’s church lands at Kilmihil. They are rough monoliths over 7 feet high near a fort called Kilbride, where, however, no church remains. Dun names:—Dunbeg and Dunmore, the last the old Dun mór mhic an Fearmacaigh.1 Doonogan and Doonsallagh lie northward. Grianan occurs as a fort name near Kilfarboy church. Forts near Milltown Malbay (0. S. 30). Most of the ring-forts in Kilfarboy and Kilmurry-Ibrickan have little special interest. About 42 remain in the first parish and 73 in the second, the barony possessing about 150 in all. I select as typical the following three examples, all near Milltown Malbay. Rinbaun—The name is loosely applied to a ring-fort in the townland of Emlagh and not far from the village of Quilty. It lies at some distance from Rinbaun headland, which was called Emlagh Point in the map of 1838, no name for the fort being then given. The liss is a well-preserved earthwork. The outer ring has been much levelled to the south and east, and an old laneway runs through the northern segment of the fosse. The latter is from 12 feet to 15 feet wide at the bottom, and usually 5 feet deep. The mound is 25 feet thick at the base and 6 feet on top, being 9 to 10 feet high over the fosse and 5 feet over the garth. The earthworks were all faced with slab masonry, but little now remains. The garth measures inside 75 feet north and south by 78 feet east and west, being slightly oval; there are low mounds of a house site to the west, behind which, round the foot of the mound, is a narrow passage 2 feet wide and at present only 3 feet high; it is roofed with long slabs; the outer wall is only a foot thick; about 10 feet is
CAHERMURPHY CASTLE AND ITS EARTHWORKS 133 broken out, but the firmly set roof-slabs project and hold up the bank; the passage is complete for about 10 feet to the south. It is a rare feature, especially in an earthen fort, being similar to those in the Grianan of Aileach and the so-called “Fort of the Wolves” at Fahan in
Kerry. The outer ring to the north-west is only 3 feet thick and high. The entrance was to the south, but there are cattle gaps to the northwest and north-east. The fort commands a pleasant view towards the sea. I found no trace of any fort at Caherrush. The castle, of which an angle134 ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND was still standing in 1887, is now only marked by a mound of debris and a modern dry-stone pier as a landmark. A little to the east of it are apparent traces of a two-roomed but. The northern part is nearly destroyed by falls of the bank; a semicircle 35 feet across remains with a door-gap to the south ; beside the latter is a small cell 12 feet by 15 feet with a door to the east; the walls are 4 feet thick, 6 feet at the junction, and hardly a foot high; on the rising ground is an unenclosed killeen graveyard with rude slab-tombs. Leagard South.—Passing the picturesque bridge of Bealaclugga we cross the sedgy Annagh River. The supposed meaning of Bealaclugga, ford of the skulls, was corroborated when, in digging for the foundations of the bridge in 1822, a number of human skeletons were found. Close to the bridge are the sandhills, covered with coarse grass and pansies, with harebells and other flowers, the highest mound being Knockatuder, rising 120 feet above the sea. Behind these was an extensive early settlement sheltered from the sea breeze. Thin layers of shells, burned stones and slabs, with much charcoal, remain about 2 feet 6 inches under the close sward. The shells are usually periwinkle and limpet, with a few specimens of the dog-whelk. In parts there is a second layer, apparently of limpets only, 2 feet above the former, just under the sward. The digging away of the sand has destroyed the actual settlement, for large hearth-slabs burned red and black, and numerous cooking pebbles, are never in situ, but abound in the dug-out spaces. I am told that stone implements have been found in the remains, but saw none. The ring-fort of Leagard is beside the road to Milltown Malbay. It looks imposing with the thick, tall thorn-bushes on its earthwork, but is a mere ring with no fosse 4 to 6 feet high and 10 feet thick, the garth 69 feet to 70 feet inside, with no foundations. Crossing the low field and little brook southward, we pass up by the old road to the summit of the low ridge to a finer and more typical fort in Dough.
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