Hut site, Baile An Bhúlaeraigh Theas, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On the steep south-western slopes of Knockmoylemore, looking out over the lower Garfinny valley and Trabeg, sits a ringfort that most people would walk past without a second glance.
Known as Lisillaundarrig, or Lios Oileán Garbh in Irish, it belongs to the univallate type, meaning it is enclosed by a single earthen or stone bank rather than the multiple concentric rings associated with higher-status sites. What makes it quietly notable is what occupies its interior: a mound of stones in the north-western sector marking the remains of a clochán, the Irish term for a small dry-stone corbelled hut, roughly beehive-shaped, of a kind associated with early medieval settlement and monastic practice across the Atlantic coastline of Ireland.
The clochán here was recorded on Ordnance Survey maps, and archaeological work drawing on J. Cuppage's 1986 survey of the Dingle Peninsula, published as part of the Corca Dhuibhne archaeological survey, documented what remains. A two-metre section of the inner wall-face survives on the western side, standing to just 25 centimetres in height; the rest has collapsed into the mound of rubble that now defines the site. It is a slight survival, but enough to confirm the structure's presence and general form. The ringfort itself, catalogued as KE043-167, occupies ground with real elevation and outlook, the kind of position that would have made practical sense for a small farmstead or enclosure in the early medieval period, offering visibility across a stretch of the Dingle Peninsula's interior valleys.