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Drumena : Stone Fort

CountyDown
Grid RefJ 311 340
GPSJ 31113 34036 (6m)
Longitude5° 59' 19.53" W
Latitude54° 14' 17.91" N
Nearest TownCastlewellan (3.6 Km)
OS Sheet29
UTM zone30U
UTM x305236.95655174
UTM y6014160.1566705

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Drumena - Souterrain
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Visit Notes

Sunday, 23rd February 2003

The walls of this little stone fort reach a height of about 1.7m and are about 3m thick. You enter through a very narrow gap, which could well be the original entrance. There is a wider gap in the south side which was probably added later so that the fort could be used as a cattle bawn.

In the centre there are the foundations of some huts, but these are not all that clear - at least one oval structure can be identified. The most interesting feature of this site is the soutterain.

One very odd thing about the site is that it is only halfway up the hill, meaning defensively it would have been hopeless! Any attackers could have got above the fort and rained down missiles into the centre. The map shows another stone fort further up the hill, so perhaps this was just an outpost of that one - or a T.J. Westropp said in the 1920s perhaps some of these structures were not defensive but ritual.

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All Sites Visited On 23rd February 2003    « Previous Site    Next Site »

Sunday, 26th August 2007

I had returned here on my way home to find the nearby cist, which is quite superb. It is also very difficult to find! I didn't manage it. However, I was able to take some photos of the cashel from slopes above it.

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All Sites Visited On 26th August 2007    « Previous Site    Next Site »

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Random Gazetteer

A Random Selection of Nearby Monuments

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8 Km (E) there is a Standing Stone at Wateresk.
8.2 Km (NW) there is a Stone Pair at Moneyslane.
6 Km (E) there is a Round Tower at Maghera.
8.3 Km (E) there is a Portal Tomb at Wateresk.
8.5 Km (WSW) there is a Court Tomb at Goward.

A Selection of Other Stone Forts

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