Enclosure, Deerpark, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Enclosures

Enclosure, Deerpark, Co. Kerry

Beneath the pasture at Deerpark in County Kerry lies the outline of an enclosure that has effectively vanished from the surface of the earth, yet remains visible from the sky.

Measuring roughly 40 metres by 30 metres in an oval shape, it survives only as a shadow site, a term used when buried or levelled features cause slight differences in soil moisture or crop growth that become legible in aerial photography. Walk across the field and you would have no idea it was there.

The enclosure was identified through aerial survey photography, catalogued under reference OSAP 2119-20, which captured the faint tonal variations in the ground that betray something older lying beneath. What that something is remains an open question. Oval enclosures of this kind in Ireland are often associated with early medieval settlement, the kind of enclosed farmstead or domestic compound that once organised rural life across the country, though without excavation it is impossible to say more with confidence. What adds a little texture to the picture is a possible network of field walls located roughly 300 metres to the north-west, suggesting that this corner of Kerry may once have carried a more structured agricultural or settlement landscape than the present empty pasture implies.

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Pete F
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