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Rath MaeveHenge
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We'd been up at the crowded Hill of Tara sites, open to the public and increasingly popular, and felt the need to escape to somewhere quieter. Rath Maeve (misnamed, like the monuments up at Tara) henge is on private land, usually full of livestock with the banks overgrown and generally as unsatisfying as Tara itself. However, not today. We spent well over an hour here and got quite a sense of the place, but as usual left with as many questions as answers. It's described as a henge on the SMR and is really rather massive, so you can see why some think it a hillfort. The interior is low dome-shaped and as a result, from ground level, it's hard to see the opposite bank in places. The bank on the northern perimeter is the best preserved and, in mid-March, not too overgrown to appreciate. The southern arc has quite a bit of bank remaining but doesn't rise to the same height as at the north, but, like at the north, falls away to a depth of about 4 metres. The eastern edge of the bank has been flattened, with the modern road just skirting its edge. A modern field boundary cuts off the western sector from the rest of the monument and that portion was too overgrown to explore. As mentioned above, the best preserved and most interesting part of the henge is at the north. There's a gap just west of north with a clear view up to the Hill of Tara. The back of the bank here resembles a defensive rampart more than a ceremonial enclosure and the construction is impressive. That said, I still had the sense that this was a place of ceremony. |
Posted by ryaner25th March 2020ce |
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Visited 23.5.11 My last visit on a very successful days 'old stoning' (despite the wind) Whilst visiting the Hill of Tara I saw a sign post for this site and obviously just had to investigate! There was room to pull the car in and then it was a quick 'up and over' the rusty padlocked metal field gate. The field was full of sheep. The large bank (covered in trees/bushes etc) is to the right of the gate and is fairly high – about 3 metres. I climbed to the top and scanned across the field to see if I could follow the contour. The bank on the far side did not look anywhere near as impressive and appeared to be largely ploughed out. This is a large site. The incessant wind showed no sign of letting up and by now it had started to rain. Sophie had had enough for the day and was crying in the car so I didn't hang around and soon headed back to the field gate. If I am ever in the area again I will have to have a proper look around. |
Posted by CARL 8th June 2011ce |
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From archaeology.ie: Described by Stout (1991: 257) as: Rath Maeve is located on an escarpment which occurs on the summit of a ridge 1km south of the Hill of Tara. The soil is a grey-brown podzolic. A bank encloses an oval, dome-shaped interior with an overall diameter of 240m north-south by 275m east-west. It is best preserved in the north and south, where the bank reaches a maximum internal height of 2.5m, with a flattened top, and an accentuated drop to the exterior of 4m. In well-preserved stretches, the bank is 7-10m wide at the base. It reaches a maximum width of 15m in the West. The ground level surrounding the enclosure to the west is much lower than the level of the interior owing to its location on the escarpment. Thus the builders of this monument used a natural feature to enhance the size of the enclosing banks, and the shape of the natural escarpment dictated, to a certain extent, the ground plan of Rath Maeve. A townland boundary ditch runs outside the north-east section of the site; with dimensions of 1.5m wide and 1m deep, it could not have been the source of the bank. This material is most likely to have come from a scarped area, 25m wide, which can be traced along the inside edge or the bank. This gives the interior of Rath Maeve a domed shape common amongst the larger embanked enclosures. There are a number of breaks along the circuit of the enclosure, most of which appear to be the result of later disturbance. The original western (259 degrees T) entrance has a maximum width of 20m, and has been hollowed out of the natural escarpment. The townland boundary, which cuts across the western end of the monument, has an irregular kink and may have been diverted in this manner to respect an internal feature which was remove after the construction of the boundary. This occurs at the highest point within the enclosure, at a position where the entire site is visible. A circular cropmark, probably a ring-ditch lies north-east of this feature (L. Swan, pers. comm.). (Petrie 1837, 206; ÓRíordain 1964, 24; Evans 1966, 177) Date of revision: 10 January 2017 This monument is subject to a preservation order made under the National Monuments Acts 1930 to 2014 (PO no. 2/2008). References: 1. Evans, E.E. 1966 Prehistoric and Early Christian Ireland: a guide. London. Batsford. 2. Moore, M. 1987 Archaeological inventory of county Meath. Dublin. Stationery Office. 3. Ó Ríordáin, S. P. 1964 Tara: the monuments on the hill. Dundalgan Press, Dundalk 4. Petrie, G. 1837 On the history and antiquities of Tara Hill. Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, 18, 22-232. 5. Stout, G. 1991 The embanked enclosures of the Boyne region. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 91C, 245-84. 6. Thornton, G. 1980 A survey of the earthen enclosures of the Boyne Valley and related sites. MA thesis, University College, Dublin. |
Posted by ryaner 21st March 2020ce |
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