Burial ground, Killarida, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Burial Grounds
In the low-lying fields of Killarida in north Kerry, an unusual triangular enclosure sits quietly in the landscape, its shape alone enough to raise questions.
Most early Irish burial grounds and ecclesiastical enclosures are roughly circular or oval, following a tradition that stretches back through the early medieval period. A triangular one is a rarity, and this site's geometry may owe something to circumstance as much as intention: a later fieldbank cutting across the western sector appears to have truncated whatever was originally here, leaving only a portion of a once-larger complex visible above ground.
What survives is an inner triangular area measuring 54 metres long by 26 metres wide, enclosed by an earthen bank with numerous gaps along its length. Beyond that inner enclosure, further earthen ridges curve and run outward to the south-south-west and north-east, suggesting the site once had a more elaborate series of boundaries, the kind of layered enclosure often associated with early ecclesiastical settlements in Ireland. In the north-east sector, a raised area aligned roughly east to west has been identified as the probable foundations of a small church, though the remains are incomplete and full measurements could not be taken. A roughly rectangular projection, approximately 8 metres by 9 metres, juts out about 12 metres from the eastern end, which may indicate the outline of a chancel or ancillary structure. The place was known as Kyle Burial Ground, a name that first appears marked, and already noted as a site rather than an active location, on a map from 1939. Significantly, it does not appear at all on the Ordnance Survey maps of 1841 to 1842, which suggests either that it had already fallen out of local memory or that its identity as a burial ground was not formally recognised at that time. The 1995 North Kerry Archaeological Survey, compiled by C. Toal, provides the principal record of its features.