Fulacht fia, Drombohilly, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On a west-facing slope above Kenmare Bay, a low grass-covered mound sits beside a stream in rough hill pasture, looking for all the world like a natural feature of the land.
It is not. Measuring roughly five metres across and just over a metre high, it is composed of burnt material, the accumulated debris of repeated ancient cooking, and it belongs to a category of monument found in extraordinary numbers across the Irish countryside.
A fulacht fia is a Bronze Age cooking site, typically consisting of a trough, a hearth, and a mound of fire-cracked stones. The method was straightforward: stones were heated in a fire and then dropped into a water-filled trough to bring it to a boil, after which meat could be cooked. The discarded, shattered stones built up over time into the crescent or horseshoe-shaped mounds that survive today. The site at Drombohilly follows this pattern, with the mound sitting on the south bank of a stream that would have supplied the necessary water. Burnt material is visible where the mound has eroded at its northern edge. A second possible example of the same monument type lies roughly 120 metres to the south-south-east, suggesting this slope above the bay may have seen repeated or sustained use over time.