Souterrain, Strandsend, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Souterrain, Strandsend, Co. Kerry

Beneath a stretch of road on the south side of the Ferta river estuary in County Kerry, there is an archaeological feature that no Ordnance Survey map has ever recorded and which, today, leaves no visible trace whatsoever on the ground above it.

The site at Strandsend is, in the most literal sense, a place that has been deliberately erased.

A souterrain is an underground structure of dry-laid stone, typically consisting of interconnected passages and chambers, built in early medieval Ireland for purposes that remain debated, most likely some combination of storage, refuge, and ventilation for nearby settlements. The example at Strandsend was discovered some decades ago and found to extend, in part, directly beneath the Cahersiveen to Killorglin road. Faced with an obvious safety concern, Kerry County Council took the practical decision to infill the structure entirely. The passages and chambers, built without mortar by hands working perhaps a thousand years ago, are now packed solid and sealed under tarmac and soil. There is nothing left to see at the surface, and the site does not appear on any mapping.

This is, in a strange way, the entire point of interest. Souterrains are by nature subterranean and easy to miss, but most at least leave some faint depression or grassed-over hollow to hint at what lies beneath. At Strandsend, even that has gone. The road carries traffic between two Kerry towns, and the vast majority of drivers passing over this particular stretch will have no idea that a dry-stone underground structure, with all its passages intact until relatively recently, once ran beneath their wheels.

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Pete F
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