DeDanaan

Cashel, Caiseal : (An Caisleán in Irish, meaning “the castle”) Stone-walled ring forts or cashels are essentially the same as Raths except that they are surrounded by drystone walls rather than earthen embankments. There are even a few sites on which both techniques are used. Cashels are more frequently found in the west of Ireland where stone is more easily acquired and excavation in the stony earth is correspondingly more difficult. A ráth (anglicised rath), was made of earth, caiseal (northwestern Ireland, anglicised cashel) and cathair (southwestern Ireland) were built of stone.

In a cattle-dominated society it is generally argued that the purpose of the ringfort was to provide protection to a small community and their livestock during a ‘hit and run’ raid for cattle. The idea being that the ringfort would provide adequate defense for a small period of time. Early Christian texts stress the importance and role of the banks in signifying nobility, kingship and authority. This relationship can be quite clearly seen in the following extract from the Críth Gablach:

What is the due of a king who is always in residence at the head of his tuath? Seven score feet of perfect feet are the measure of his stockade on every side. Seven feet are the thickness of its earthwork, and twelve feet its depth. It is then that he is a king, when ramparts of vassalage surround him. What is the rampart of vassalage? Twelve feet are the breadth of its opening and its depth and its measure towards the stockade. Thirty feet are its measure outwardly.

As can be seen from the above text, the relationship between the banks of a ringfort and vassalage is quite clear. With the argument being that the more elaborate the ringfort, usually in the forms of multiple outlying banks, the higher of the status of the occupant.

Cairn : (Middle English; cárne, from Scottish Gaelic; cárn, from Old Irish) a manmade pile of stones. They are nearly always in uplands, on moors or mountain tops. In prehistoric times it was usually erected over a burial. A barrow is sometimes called a cairn. They are built for several purposes:

*To mark a path across stony or barren terrain, and across glaciers.
*To mark the summit of a mountain.
*To mark a burial site, or in commemoration of the dead.
*Some are also merely sites where a farmer has removed large amounts of stone from a field.

Additionally cairns have been used to commemorate all kinds of events from sites of battles to places where a cart has tipped over.

They vary from loose, small piles of stones to elaborate feats of engineering. In some places, games are regularly held to find out who can build the most beautiful cairn. The word can take in various types of hill, and natural stone piles. Naturally, due to the idea’s simplicity, cairns can be found all over the world in alpine or mountainous regions.

The present-day traditions of building cairns emerged from the Bronze Age habit of putting cists into cairns, which would be situated in conspicuous positions, often on the skyline above the village of the deceased. These cairns are still to be found, but are often much bigger than modern day ones in Scotland.

Tumulus : A tumulus (plural tumuli) is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds or kurgans and can be found throughout much of the world. A tumulus composed largely or entirely of stones is usually referred to as a cairn.

The method of inhumation may involve a cist, a mortuary enclosure, a mortuary house or a chamber tomb. Examples of barrows include Duggleby Howe and Maes Howe.

Dún : (dOOn) Dún comes from the Brythonic Din and Gaelic Dún, meaning fort, and is now used as a general term for small stone-built strongholds, enclosures or roundhouses in Scotland, as a sub-group of hill forts. In some areas they seem to have been built on any suitable crag or hillock, particularly south of the Firth of Clyde and the Firth of Forth down across the border into Northumberland.

Dúns appear to have arrived with the Brythonic Celts in about the 7th century BC, associated with their Iron age culture of warrior tribes and petty chieftains. Early Dúns had near vertical ramparts constructed of stone laced with timber, and where this was set on fire (accidentally or on purpose) it forms the vitrified forts where stones have been partly melted, an effect that is still clearly visible. Use of Dúns continued in some cases into the medieval period.

The word in its original sense appears in many place names, and can include fortifications of all sizes and types, for example Din Eidyn, in Gaelic Dún Éideann which the Angles (Anglos) renamed Edinburgh, and the Broch Dun Telve in Glenelg.

Crannog : (Irish Gaelic - crannóg, wooden structure, pole, from Middle Irish; crannóc, from Old Irish; from crann = tree) Prehistoric habitation built over the shallow waters of a lake shore or a marsh, usually erected on pile-supported platforms, but sometimes on artificial mounds. Crannogs were used for a settlement and usually linked to shore with a timber gangway or stone causeway. Such a site afforded easy access to a varied food supply by the availability of fish, marsh fowl, and good crop lands. Remains of Bronze Age lake dwellings were discovered in Britain, Ireland, and central Europe.

Rath : (Ir. rath) circular hill fort protected by earthworks, used by the ancient Irish in the pre-Christian era as a retreat in time of danger. Some of the larger raths, such as that at Tara, were important in early Irish history and were used by chieftains or kings. Many raths remain throughout Ireland. The interior diameter can range from 50 to over 200 feet. The interior is sometimes sited on a natural or artificial mound. There may also be a souterrain, a subterranean room used probably for storage.

Barrow : in archaeology, a burial mound. Earth and stone or timber are the usual construction materials; in parts of SE Asia stone and brick have entirely replaced earth. A barrow built primarily of stone is often called a cairn. Barrows occur in many parts of the world; they were built during the Neolithic period in Western Europe and in recent times in Buddhist countries. In European prehistory the characteristic barrows are either long or round. The long ones are from the Neolithic period and often contain several burial chambers. They may have been intended to simulate cave burials. The stone chambers were placed at one end of the mound and were approached by a passage, sometimes over 300 ft (90 m) in length. Round barrows, usually dating from the Bronze Age, normally contain a single burial. The round barrow was commonly bell shaped; another type had a low central mound that invariably contained cremated remains and was surrounded by a walled ditch or a circle of standing stones, usually about 150 ft (50 m) in diameter. Barrow building in Europe continued until the Christian era. Roman, Saxon, and Viking barrows are known, though such burials were apparently reserved for important personages. The erection of mounds over burials has been widespread. The round barrow or stupa of Asia is usually a shrine for relics of the Buddha.

Cromlech : (Welsh or Breton) crom, feminine of crwm, arched + llech, stone; =crooked stone, term that has changed in meaning from its original equivalent to dolmen. It later came to be used for a single standing stone and now usually refers to a circle of such stones; however, the term is used in this sense for such remains on the Continent, e.g., Britanny and Portugal, rather than for those on the British Isles.

Dolmen : n. A prehistoric megalith typically having two upright stones and a capstone [syn: cromlech, menhir]; French, from Breton *taolvean : *taol alteration (influenced by taol, table), of tol, key + men, stone.