Field boundary, Drombohilly, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Ritual/Ceremonial

Field boundary, Drombohilly, Co. Kerry

On a north-west-facing slope above Kenmare Bay, two low walls of stone emerge from the surface of the bog at Drombohilly, their rubble spilling gradually downhill.

They are easy to overlook, not much more than half a metre thick and thirty centimetres high where they still stand proud of the peat, and they do not correspond to any field boundary still in use. What they represent is an older idea of enclosure, something organised and deliberate, now largely swallowed by ground that has been accumulating slowly around them for an unknown length of time.

The two walls are not continuous with one another. One runs roughly east from a hut site to the west, extending for approximately thirty-four metres across the rough hill pasture. A hut site, in this context, refers to the low circular or sub-rectangular remains of a small dwelling, typically from early medieval or prehistoric occupation of upland ground. The second wall begins near an outcropping rock, heads south-east for about six metres, then curves gradually southward and south-westward for a further thirty-two metres, suggesting it was laid out to follow the natural contours of the slope or to enclose a particular area of grazing. Scattered rubble downslope from both walls indicates that more material once stood here than survives today. The outcropping rock that anchors part of the second wall is characteristic of this kind of hill country in south-west Kerry, where builders worked with what the landscape provided rather than imposing geometry onto it.

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Pete F
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