Belcoo

Belcoo stands where Upper and Lower Lough MacNean meet through a narrow channel, overlooked by the Cuilcagh uplands of western Ulster. This short water passage provided one of the few easy crossings through a country of lakes, limestone ridges and wet lowland. Paths from Fermanagh, Breifne and Cavan met at the ford and narrow neck.

The Book of Magauran called the place Cunga in the fourteenth century. An Ulster saga also preserved the name Belcu in a tale involving Conall Cernach, while the surrounding townland names record the narrow strip of land. Medieval chiefs of Fermanagh and Breifne competed for the crossing without creating a large walled town.

English plantation surveys mapped the passage in 1607 and 1609. A fort was erected during the Irish Rebellion of 1641, and the barracks recorded in 1718 continued the military use of the ford. Belcoo therefore remained a small settlement defined by lake travel, cattle movement and contested roads between Ulster and Connacht. Lake boats carried people and goods between its shores, while cattle and small farms occupied the limestone clearings around the narrowing. Small boats, cattle droves and foot travelers shared the crossing, and fairs brought trade to the lakeside settlement. The narrow crossing made the surrounding lakes part of one economic world, linking market villages that lay several miles apart by water.