stood on the site of the Flemmyngs' later castle and the present mansion at the foot of the hill near the Boyne.1

LOUTH.-The mote was figured by Wright before it was planted. It was then called the "Fairy mount," suggesting a sidh among Irish speakers. There was a "royal fort" in Lugmadh in 1164, where dwelt Donat O'Carroll, chief of Oriel; he harboured certain "profaners" of the "bachal Isu," the famous crosier of St. Patrick, and (it was believed, by the vengeance of the saint) fire spread from his residence, and destroyed the town. The Normans built a castle at Louth in 1203.

FAUGHART, LOUTH.-The imposing mote at Faughart is believed to have been the residence of St. Brigid's father. Extensive souterrains, roofed with slabs and yielding clay vessels, were found in the field round its base, and imply its early origin. "Fochert in Murthemne" is named in the Tain bo Cuailnge3 as the place where Cuchullin threw the hollyhafted spear back to his once-loved foster-brother, with fatal results. "The hill is named Fithi for ever"; unless the "hill" was a mote, no fort is there mentioned. The alleged Norman castle of Faughart was really built in Fothered Onolan in Wexford. There are three forts at Faughart-the mote called Motafadart, the others, Motaantsean and Rathsaileach. The first is 40 feet across the platform; near it fell Edward Bruce in the deadly battle called after Dundalk.

WERE SOME MOTES DANISH ?-We have now seen that several motes were pre-historic, and several more were certainly pre-Norman. The question next arising is-Were some motes made by the Danes? Giraldus attributed all the motes to them and to the time of Turgesius; but the only importance we can attach to his statement was that the motes had been made long before his time, and were then "empty and deserted." The great mounds in Denmark are not very similar to Irish motes, and are often, if not generally, sepulchral. Even were they similar and evidently residential, the mere fact of their occurrence in Denmark would not prove the Irish ones to be made by Danes, any more than by Gauls, Germans, or Austrians, in whose countries identical motes remain. Had they been Danish, motes ought to abound round the cities of the Ostmen; but for fifteen miles round Limerick not a mote is to be found. Tradree and Corcovaskin, both Danish settlements, have no motes. Dublin, Cork, and Dungarvan, are not centres of mote groups. The Ostman territory round the first-the Dyflinarskidi, extending from Leixlip and Clondalkin to the north of Fingal-has only a couple of so-called motes, and those

1 1 Down Survey, Meath, Map 47, P. R. O. I. For the mote and castle see Journal, vol. xxxi., pp. 406, 430.

2 Annals of the Four Masters": the "Liss of Louth" is named ante 524 in the "Book of Leinster, p. 361.

3 Ed. Farraday, p. 72.

4 Giraldus, Invasion," Lib. I., vol. exxiii., and Register of Abbey of St. Thomas, Dublin, 308.

not high ones; none near the city. So the negative evidence is strongly against the Danish origin of high motes.1

The belief that they were occupied by the Danes rests, however, on firm basis. We have tangible proof, such as Domnal Sealshead's sword at Greenmount, and historical proof in the record of the Wars of the Gaedhil. The latter must be rather cautiously received, for, though accurate in the main lines, it evidently grossly exaggerates the state of subjection of the Irish, in order to exalt their heroic deliverers, Mahon and Brian. However, softening down sweeping statements, it is evident that the passage, "There was not a harbour nor 'port' (camp), nor dun, nor dangan, nor 'dingna' in all Munster without fleets of Danes and pirates," represents a substantial truth. The next section tells of "duns and dangans built through Munster and through Erin by the invaders." The duns at Dublin and Limerick are named, and the former was full of spoils gathered "from dun and dangan and diongna (Dr. Todd translates this mound'), and from artificial caves.'

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The "Annals" mention the plunder and burning of places where motes exist. Dundalethglaise (825 and 941), Lismore (832), Clones (836 and 1095), Lowth (830, 839), and Granard (1066); but they only tell of forts built by the foreigners at Luimneach (Limerick, 968), Corcagh (Cork, 848), Atheliath (Dublin, 851), the longport of Linnduachail (841), the dun of Turgeis near Lough Ree (ante 845) and the dun of Amlave, at Clondalkin, burned in 866. Their nature is not indicated anywhere.

DUBLIN.—It is rather hard to establish the position of the Danish fort of Dublin. Belief and probability point to the site of the later castle; but the Danish garrison, during a twenty days' siege in 987, could "only get sea-water to drink, ," which would hardly have been the case if it stood on the "pyll" of the river Poddle. The Thingmote and other mounds were probably sepulchral-some certainly were so-like the little tumuli near Clontarf station. The Ostmen's town lay on the north bank of the river, near the Four Courts and the old Danish church of St. Michan. The "terracing up" of Dublin Castle may have been done with a levelled earthwork; but I prefer to leave the subject to students of the history of the city (who have too long been content to walk after the older writers), merely indicating the difficulties. Indeed, the want of fresh water, and the unimpeded view from the fortress of the great fight of 1014, called after Clontarf, but more truly "the battle of Dublin," suggest

I cannot find even the slightest evidence for the confident statement (ingenious e:ough, but unsupported) that the Danes were really the De Danann. The Danish tradition is also found in the Hebrides, and may be a derivative of the theory of Giraldus and Molyneux. No evidence has been shown for a 66 Tuatha De Danann theory among early antiquaries. The "Caesar's camps" in Gaul, "Huns' graves" in Denmark, Attila's camps" in Germany, all embody upgrowths of like popular tradition, founded on hints from history. The great Cromwell myth" in Ireland is a priceless example of modern popular myth-making of a similar kind.

2 Ed. Todd, pp. 41, 113.

4" On the Battlements of the Grianan” (“ Wars G. and G.,” pp. 191, 193).

a fortress to the east of the present castle and on the beach of the estuary.

There is no

The "Thingmote," as all know, stood between the present church of St. Andrew and Trinity College; not on the site of the former, as stated by Dr. George Stokes. It was one of a group of tumuli, "the hogges over the stein," as the "Song of Dermot " calls them, one of which was opened near Trinity College in 1646, and the bones of a man found. direct evidence to show that the Thingmote was made for its later purpose, and it was probably a tomb. It appears in records only from 1240, when Thengmotha in parochia S. Andree Thengmoth" was granted by John Thurgot to the adjoining Abbey of All Hallows, where Trinity College now stands, some seventy years after the Normans took Dublin from the Ostmen. In 1575 "the road leading to Hoggen Green" was called "Teigmote." The mound was called " a fortified hill by the College" when seized by Lord Ormonde's mutinous soldiers in 1647; a mount or hill set by the city to Sir William Davis," and "the mount near St. Andrew's church," on the map of 1672.2 It long remained, but unfortunately was used to fill in the present Nassau-street. So recorded facts merely mark its later usage as a Thingmote, and that it was one of a group of tumuli near the stein or long pillar-stone; and so most probably it was no residential mote. So commonly did the Irish hold their aenachs (or great fairs and gatherings) round burial-mounds, as at Carman, Tailtinn, and Magh Adhair, that the "Danes" possibly found the "mote" a centre of assembly, even when they founded the city.

WERE SOME MOTES NORMAN ?-To anyone reading Dr. Christison's thoughtful and valuable work on the "Early Fortifications of Scotland," the fact that true motes were made in late medieval times must be familiar. For example, he quotes decisive testimony from the "Life of St. John, Bishop of Terouaine in Belgium," in the eleventh century, showing that motes were then of rather recent construction. The Bishop came to the fortress which had been "built many years ago by the lord of the town after the fashion of the country. . . . For it was customary for the rich men and nobles of those parts (because their chief occupation is the carrying on of feuds and slaughters, in order that they may have the greater power for either conquering their equals or keeping down their inferiors) to heap up a mound of earth as high as they were able, and to dig round it a broad, open, and deep ditch, and to girdle the whole edge of the mound, instead of a wall, with a barrier of wooden planks stoutly fixed together, with numerous turrets set around. Within was constructed a

house, or rather a citadel, commanding the whole, so that the gate of entry

1" Louthiana," Part II., p. 15.

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"Scandinavian Kingdom of Dublin," by Charles Haliday (ed. Prendergast, 1882), pp. 163-4. See also Register of All Hallows, Dublin." Enrolment of 1575 deed in Patent Rolls, xxii., James I., and Carte Papers (Bodleian Library), vol. xvii., p. 133.

3 Ed. 1898, p. 4.

could only be approached by a bridge, which, springing from the counterscarp of the ditch, was gradually raised as it advanced, supported by sets of piers, two or even three trussed on each side, over convenient spans, crossing the ditch with a managed ascent, so as to reach the upper level of the mound, landing on its edge on a level at the threshold of the gate." This mound was so high that when the Bishop was half way down the bridge, he was still 35 feet above the ground. From this height, by malice of the devil and the weight of the crowd, the bridge broke and threw all into the fosse; but by the sanctity of the bishop all escaped unhurt. This remarkable account is equally illustrated by several representations of palisaded motes shown on the nearly contemporaneous Bayeux tapestry.

The Merovingian strongholds had oblong, earthen walls, with a stockade, palisaded mounds, and a lofty "butte," or "motte," supporting a wooden tower, and with deep and wide fosses.1

I have, from the analogy of the ring-forts, been strongly inclined to the belief that some of the Irish motes might be as late, or later, and some even Norman. The main difficulty is how the Normans, with their small bands, and ability only to scatter, not to coerce, the natives, could have raised these great earthworks; but if we hold this belief, we do it without the support of any unmistakable record, for the "mot" (even in the "Song of Dermot ") may have meant a low entrenchment.

1 Rev. S. Baring Gould's "Deserts of France," vol. ii., pp. 110-111.

2 Mr. Mills (Deputy Keeper of the Records) points out that the conditions under

Of late a belief has grown up that because the Normans made motes all, or at least the majority, of these structures in Ireland must be Norman. For example, Mrs. Armitage, in a learned paper on the English motes,' with the approval of more than one leading antiquary, writes:-"From Ireland we obtain evidence of the same kind. The mote-and-bailey castle is to be found in Ireland, but only in the English Pale, that is, the part of the country conquered by the Normans in the twelfth century. There can be no doubt that the Normans were the builders of mottes in Ireland." Now, I had read this essay before the publication of my "Ancient Ferts of Ireland"; but I did not see fit to modify my statements, because:-(1) The author does not seem to have consulted early Irish records, (2) or to have noted their decisive evidence as to the existence of great forts, in long pre-Norman times, in the places where motes and baileys are now found; (3) or that Giraldus Cambrensis and Jocelin of Furness allude to the great motes as existing long before their time, and (especially the former) never compare them to the motes which, according to the above essay, were being made everywhere around the writers. (4) Giraldus describes several forts raised soon after the invasion of Ireland, but not a single high mote appears among them; and he attributes the deserted high motes to Turgesius. (5) The motes are not confined to the English Pale, even in its widest acceptation, but occur in places which the Normans never held, and do not occur in important Norman settlements. (6) The author seems unaware of early objects found in the mote and bailey forts.

In no ignorance, then, of the work of English antiquaries, but on account of their ignoring nearly all Irish evidence and topography, have I been obliged to reject their conclusions, so far as regards Irish high motes.

The theory of the sole Norman origin of Irish motes argues from the particular to the universal. It is based on the mention, in the "Song of Dermot and the Earl," of Flemmyng having made a "mot" at Slane, and Tyrrell having lost the castle of Trim, the "mot" of which was levelled by the Irish. At each of these places an important ancient fort stood centuries before the advent of the Norman. Slane we have dealt with, but (apart from other mention) the "Tripartite Life" mentions the dun of Feidlimid, son of Laoghaire, son of Niall, as at Athdruimm, or

which the great Irish motes were evidently made did not exist in the reign of Henry II. I find plenty of evidence for the later servile condition of the "nativi " and hibernici on the Norman manors, as, for example, that deed in the "Black Book of Limerick" (p. 205) where Roger Waspayl is granting to Matthew, the parson of Ratheneser church (near Rathkeale), the lands between Rathgul and the great water of Del. Waspayl carefully reserves the "nativi" for his own use. Circa 1210-1224. There is not, however, any mote on the manors round Rathkeale.

1 Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol. xxiv. (1899-1900), p. 276; and Journal, vol. xxxii., p. 429.

2 Lines 3174, &c., and 3330, &c.