Hut site, An Gleann Iarthach, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, An Gleann Iarthach, Co. Kerry

On the edge of a west-facing cliff in An Gleann Iarthach, a small rectangle of drystone walling sits half-collapsed in rough hill grazing, overlooking Valencia Island and the distant silhouette of Sceilg Mhichíl.

It is easy to walk past without registering what it is. The structure is modest to the point of near-invisibility, yet it represents a deliberate act of construction by someone who chose one of the more exposed positions imaginable on the Kerry coastline.

The hut measures 3.8 metres on its longer axis and just 2.1 metres across, which gives a sense of how compact the interior would have been. Rather than building all four walls from scratch, whoever raised this structure made use of the cliff face itself as the south-eastern boundary, laying horizontal courses of drystone, a technique requiring no mortar, relying instead on carefully selected and stacked stone, to form the remaining sides. Those surviving lower courses reach about 0.7 metres in height, with rubble from the collapsed upper portions scattered across the floor. A damaged entrance at the north-east end opens not only into the hut but also into a small annexed space, roughly 1.9 metres by 0.8 metres, the far end of which retains a covering slab. An annexe of this kind might have served as a store or a sleeping alcove, separate from whatever activity occupied the main chamber.

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Pete F
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