A Cashel "East of the Shannon" on Knigh Hill

Cashel within Mooghaun hill-fort, Co. Clare.

I visited a lovely Cashel (stone ring-fort) at Mooghaun hill-fort near Newmarket on Fergus in Co. Clare recently and it got me thinking of a farmer that told me there was only one Cashel "East of the Shannon". Now this isn't true but they are fairly rare in comparison with ring-fort to the east of the shannon. For example in North Tipp there are only 28 Cashels in comparison with 794 ring-forts. This is likely that in North Tipp that building materials for a ring-fort were more readily available such as timber for a palisade that was often built on top of them.

Interestingly of the 28, one of the most impressive was probably in the townland of Knigh near Puckane and when built would have looked like the Cashel at Mooghaun pictured above (it is likely it has been reconstructed at Mooghaun).

Daniel Grace wrote about the Cashel at Knigh in his book "Portrait of a Parish: Monsea and Killodiernan". He says it is known locally as "The Caher" and we will see that named used in the Irish Folklore Commission's entry on it.

He says "The caher at Knigh is in poor condition and the encircling wall has collapsed and overspilled. But the fallen stones on the north side were removed some years ago, exposing the outer face of the wallto a height of approximately 1m."
He also quotes John O'Donovan who visited in 1840. "The remains of a large stone fort called Cathair Boirne are visible in the townland of Knigh, one Irish mile to the north of the old church." O'Donovan translates the word 'boirne' was  as bening the genetive of 'boireann' and that it means 'a stony disctrict' or 'a rocky hill'. This however Grace disagrees with he says "Knigh hill was anciently known as 'Knockbuolly' and is marked as such on the Downe Survey map of Knigh parish drawn in the mid-seventeenth century. The correct Irish form was 'cnoc na buaile', i.e. "the hill of the booley or summer milking place'. Booleying was an ancient Irish practice whereby cattle were driven to the hills for summer grazing."

Knigh Hill - the Cashel is in the upper portion and then the cairn is to the south-west of it. 

The Irish Folklore Commission has this to say about this Cashel or Caher

"The Caher of Killard is in a field about three miles from the village of Puckane. The field in which the cahir is is the property of Mr Crosse.
One of the stories about this caher is in Pagan times the chief of this district lived in this old caher. The chiefs name was O'Brien. He had two sons.
O'Brien was a rough man and he sent his wife to work during the day. While the wife worked hard the chief and his sons adored false gods.
The men of the family stayed up nearly the whole night. They had dips for candles and these they placed on the stones at their dwelling. 
The stones can be seen yet and are remarkable for the facts that the smoke of the candles can be seen on them. Every year on the 31st June a Leupracan can be seen mending boots on one of the stones. He wears a red cap and has a pot of gold by his side.
It is said if you go into the caher and may hear men's voices, talking and laughing. It is also said that on Xmas Eve a man stands in the middle of the caher and shouts three times in an unearthly voice."

https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes/4922134/4855177

So some interesting folklore there, I don't know what to make of the "smoke of the candles" that can be seen on the stones there, any ideas what that could be? Perhaps someone in the locality knows?

There is a cairn on Knigh Hill that is visible from the cashel to south-west and this is thought to be a bronze age burial cairn, perhaps the burial place of a chief? It is located within a prehistoric hill-fort so it was an area of great importance in prehistoric times (I'll try right post about these soon). We also saw folklore associating a cairn with a chief at nearby Ashleypark.

It is interesting to note the association here with Xmas Eve and the haunting of Knigh Castle.