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Promontory Forts of Valentia Island

Promontory Forts of Valentia Island: An Dún Rua and Dún Dá Ghallán Promontory forts are very common around most of the Irish coast. 300 or so have been officially recorded, more probably exist and many have been lost. They vary from the very elaborate fortifications of Dunbeg or Dun Aengus to the more simple examples found on Valentia. At times they can be hard to identify, though the use of the Irish word Dún (fort) to name a headland is a very good indication of the existence of a promontory fort. Valentia has several forts, two of the most interesting are near each other on the north side of the island. They easy to miss as they are off the tourist grid and lack the impressive constructions of other forts. However, they show how promontory forts can vary enormously. An Dún Rua – the Red Fort – is the bigger of the two. Heavily overgrown by grass, heather, and gorse, many of its features are hidden. It is 78m wide on the landward side and approximately 58m deep. It is guarded by two ditches and banks. The outer ditch is 76m long and is one meter or so deep. Behind this is a one meter high bank, then the inner ditch around 1 meter deep and the internal bank, which is a little over 2m high and little under 5m wide. When the fort was surveyed a century ago, the bank had the remains of a drystone wall on top of it. This is long gone. This survey also found six upright slabs forming an entrance into the fort on a 12m causeway across the ditches. These slabs have now all fallen, most are hidden by grass and gorse, two are still visible, acting as a sort of entrance. Finally, inside the fort were two drystone huts, also now overgrown. After entering the fort, the ground rises somewhat, before falling around the cliff edge. It is quite spacious inside and you feel that people could have lived there – though in Winter it would have been very exposed to the ferocity of Atlantic weather. The second fort, Dún Dá Ghallán, has a very different feel. It is a on a narrow piece of land jutting outwards – 12m wide and 60m long. Its most prominent feature is the two impressive portal stones marking the entrance – but the question that arises here is the entrance to what? What sort of promontory fort was this? In front of the portal stones are the remnants of what may be a wall and a shallow ditch, on either side of a narrow walkway. This ditch is just a few meters wide, as this part of the promontory is very narrow. The two portal stones are believed to be the remnants of an elaborate entrance or doorway. They are less than 2m high, half a meter wide, and less than 20cm thick. The rest of the fort is basically featureless. It is a beautiful place, but when you visit it, you really wonder if anyone actually lived there. While it cannot be ruled out that part of the cliff has collapsed, especially since the rock underneath the end of the promontory is heavily eroded and appears to be resting – nervously - on a pillar of stone, it still does not look like anyone lived there. It is very small inside. Nor is it the most defensible site, as the landward side runs parallel to the main cliff, meaning that anyone inside could easily be hit by arrows, spears, or rocks. Probably, it was used for a more ceremonial purpose – though what that ceremony was it is impossible to say. Religious? Cultural? We will never know, all we can do is try to imagine what it was. As a bonus, near these forts, the strange meanderings of a traditional stone wall unveil a settlement. The wall zig-zags to incorporate older buildings, rectangular clochauns, two of which were attached to each other. On the far side of the wall are the foundations of two more houses, which are thought to be of a later date. There is also a souterrain (an underground passage or storage area) here and another one a few hundred meters away)… History hiding in plain sight – or almost References Mitchell, Frank, Man and the Environment in Valencia Island. (Dublin: Royal Irish Academy, 1989) O’Sullivan, Ann and Sheehan, Joh,n The Iveragh Peninsula: An Archaeological Survey of South Kerry. (Cork: UCC Press, 1996)