More than Meets the Eye

Although Rathmichael was only 10 km from my south Dublin home, in my exploring-by-bike days I never imagined there might be an ancient ring fort hidden there worth visiting for its historic importance and commanding views of Dublin Bay and coastline down to Wicklow.

Recently I came across it while looking for one of the ‘Fassaroe Crosses’, a distinct type of High Cross confined to the Dublin-Wicklow area. The cross itself can be easily missed at the entrance to a popular hiking trail but the Rath is signposted there so in looking for one I discovered the other.

The Rath turned out to be one of the most impressive I have seen, not only because of its size but because of its view.  Its stone and earthen enclosure is between 120 and 140 metres in diameter and as its centre is a smaller enclosure thought to be a ringfort from the early medieval period.

Its view out over Dublin Bay and the south coast made it an obvious lookout though tall trees on one side now limit the full panoramic view. It is believed also to have had a ceremonial role.

The name of the Rath is unusual. Early Irish Christians were happy with their own saints and rarely named a church or place after a ‘foreign’ saint or even an Archangel like Michael. Where Michael’s name is found it as at exposed spots like Skellig Michael because he was considered a protector at dangerous locations ‘at the edge of the world’. His name can be found on other remote spots on the Atlantic coasts of Europe.

As to Rathmichael, scholars believe that the present name is derived from an English corruption. Originally it was Ráth Mhic Táil, meaning ‘Mac Táil's Ringfort/Rath’.

I had come across MacTail (d. 550) at Old Kilcullen, the monastery he founded in Kildare. One of the High Crosses there depicts a bishop with a crosier in one hand stooping down with an axe in his other as if to hit a man on the ground.

MacTail’s name means ‘Son of the Adze’ and the adze is an axe-shaped  tool that could be used as a weapon. People may have thought MacTail would be a good protector against the Vikings (as his appearance on Kilcullen High Cross could indicate.) The Four Masters Annals for 937 read, ‘The foreigners were banished from Dublin by the help of God and MacTail’.  So McTail may have been an Irish St Michael, protector of Ireland’s eastern shores!

And I had missed all this in my youth while cycling around south county Dublin!

Photos: The cross at Rathmichael and McTail at Old Kilcullen; the photo of the Rath does not do it justice, you would need a drone to capture its size and location.