Some objects fill our landscape, but we just don’t see them. Growing up in Northern Ireland these mounds were everywhere.
I can remember seeing them through the car window and wondering what they were and why were they there. I think I even asked a few questions, but no one gave me a satisfactory answer. One elderly relative put a finger to her mouth, in a hushing motion, and then whispered that these mounds belonged to the fairy folk. This answer did not seem right to me, however, I just accepted their mysterious presence and peculiar abundance in Northern Ireland.
This year, I suddenly decided I wanted to know what these are and why we have so many. It was prompted by the fact I had to take my car to a garage to get it fixed, and as it was Easter, almost every other garage in the town was shut, so I had to go out into the country to a garage in the middle of nowhere. While I waited beside the garage there was a rath. I had to wait almost 30 minutes, it was the only thing to look at, and I was reminded of seeing things like this through car windows for decades, and not knowing what they were.
They are certainly distinctive, and once you’ve seen one, you can recognise others. I started to do a bit of research into these raths. Scotland has them too, but nowhere near the numbers that we have here in Northern Ireland. In fact, one of the first papers I read was comparing the raths that are found in Northwest Scotland to Northeast Scotland. Apparently northwest Scotland from Cape Wrath to Argyle and the Hebrides has only five Raths, whereas northeast Scotland from Cathness to the Firth of Fourth has over 38! These raths in Scotland have a pickish Celtic origin and in the regions where this race lived, there was an abundant number of such mounds to be found. The Picts were first mentioned in 297 AD, when a Roman writer spoke of the “Picts and Irish [Scots] attacking” Hadrian's Wall. The name, thought to be from the Latin picti, “painted”, was one of an ancient people who lived in what is now eastern and north-eastern Scotland, from Caithness to Fife. Their name may refer to their custom of body painting or possibly tattooing.
However, in Ireland, raths are found in far more abundance with an estimated number between 45,000 to 60,000 and represent the most common form of ancient monument. In fact, between 70-80% of all raths in the island of Ireland are found in Northern Ireland. No wonder I was always seeing them during my childhood! Dating from the early Christian period (500-1100AD), they are circular earthworks defined by a deep ditch and internal bank, enclosing an area of twenty to forty meters in diameter. There has been little archaeological excavation of these mounds but some have been shown to have the remains of houses and other structures. The name rath is thought to be from the Irish ráth or ráith meaning of uncertain origin.
The Irish tend to be a superstitious race and these monuments were regarded as the homes of the sídhe (fairies), earning them the title "fairy forts” just as my elderly relative had whispered. Fortunately, superstitious fear of retribution from the fairy folk dissuaded most country people from damaging these mounds and, as a consequence, protected many from destruction but not all. Another example of such superstition, found in N. Ireland, was leaving a hawthorn tree in the middle of a field, despite the difficulties of ploughing around it.
Farmers just did not want to anger the little folk and bring bad fortune on themselves by pulling out the hawthorn tree. Another recently proposed explanation is that hawthorns emit a peculiar scent to attract insects rather like the smell of gangrene and decomposing bodies. In those early times when people were more exposed to this disease and often sat with dying and the dead this smell must have seemed like the smell of death.
It is probable that raths built between 500-1100 AD were the residences of minor chieftains and served to protect their homes from cattle rustlers or other attackers. Being raised up on a height gave you a better opportunity to see who might be on the way to cause you problems. In Malta, the oldest capital city (Mdini) is found inland on a raised mound where its inhabitants would have had a panoramic view of the entire coastline on all sides, very useful in those days of sea-born attackers.
Fear of others is a powerful motivator to protect your home, family and lifestock. In the Sci-Fi series Firefly, savage and cannibalistic Reavers, were the scary villains of the story. Terrifying bloodthirsty attackers whose horror was hinted at throughout the early episodes but not seen. When the Reavers eventually turned up in a much later episode it was even more frightening as they had a horrifying reputation. On a personal note, a relative of mine used a DNA test to discover more about our ancestors and discovered that our family is descended from the Scottish Reivers. These were a group of cattle rustlers, often guilty of feuding, murder, arson and pillaging on the border between Scotland and England in the 14th – 17th century. How come others invariably find they are related to royalty or famous folk while mine turn out to be rogues? Both names Reaver and Reiver come from the Old English ‘bereafian’ which means "to take by violence, seize, or rob" and it is where we get the present-day term of bereaved. Not a great discovery to find such blood runs in our veins!
The terms used to describe these mounds can vary: fort, rath, grave mound, earthen ramparts, cairn, mottes, ring forts and cashels. Raths are usually monuments of the early Christian period 500-1200AD and are large flat-topped grass-grown mounds. Mottes were flat-topped mounds erected by anglo Normans in the late 12th or early 13th century as the bases of strongly defended dwellings of timber (and later stone) castles or dwellings.
Cashels were usually larger than raths and had a circular stone structure used for defence
With a diameter of 80-200ft.
Despite the large number of such mounds, not all have survived. There are only two Ballymurphy raths on the slope of the Belfast Hills when it is known that there used to be twenty on these hills. Unfortunately many have been demolished before even archeological excavations could be done. Another rath, elsewhere, was destroyed by the intrusion of a rubbish tip that gradually spread over it. No weapons have been found in raths or cashels but have been found in ring forts. But often the divisions between these types of mounds blur. The Mound of Down (Rathmullan) has been excavated and a report suggests that it has been many things over the centuries,
“First, a rath was built on the site at some point in the Early Christian period; secondly, the main enclosure was constructed; and finally, shortly after the arrival of John de Courcy in Ulster in 1177 AD construction of a motte upon the site of the earlier rath was begun and then abandoned before it could be completed.”
This has probably happened elsewhere and mounds were reused over the millennium. How many forts, cathedrals, and castles will have started life as a simple rath?
The Stone Age (10000 BC – 3300 BC) was followed by the Bronze Age (3300 BC-1200 BC) followed by the Iron Age (1200 BC-550 BC), the Roman period (43 AD –410 AD) and the Early Medieval period (410 AD – 1066 AD) etc so little wonder people chose to build upon earlier more ancient constructs. It is then more surprising to stumble across a feature in Northern Ireland in pristine condition that is so old it makes all the mounds mentioned earlier almost modern in comparison. Mountsandel Wood is the earliest known settlement of man in Ireland dating to between 7600 and 7900 BC.
Flint tools were found here, indicating that Stone Age hunters camped here to fish salmon in the natural weir. Archaeologists believe that Stonehenge was constructed in several phases from around 3100 BC to 1600 BC and 3200 BC is the approximate date when the earliest pyramids of Egypt were built. This Mountsandel Settlement was already over four millenniums old when these were all being constructed. However, the Stone Age period has even earlier and more intricate constructions that make Mountsandel seem both primitive and modern in comparison. Göbekli Tepe in the Southeastern Anatolia Region of Turkey was inhabited from 9500 BC to at least 8000 BC now that is impressive!
This piece started with simple green mounds I saw through the car window as a child and the mystery they represented. It continues with a run through the ages of mankind and a quick detour into my own murderous family ancestors from Scotland. It ended with a temple constructed in Turkey over 11000 years ago. Strange the paths a mind takes when freewheeling.
