Architectural fragment, An Gróbh, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Ritual/Ceremonial

Architectural fragment, An Gróbh, Co. Kerry

In the garden of a house on Main Street in Dingle, a few limestone fragments are all that remain of a medieval building that once stood almost opposite what is known as Hussey's Castle.

Most passers-by would have no reason to suspect they were there. The stones are survivors in the most literal sense: remnants of an arch and a single decorated piece that outlasted the structure they once belonged to, even as the surrounding town was rebuilt around them.

When the antiquarian Hitchcock recorded the building in 1854 to 1855, it still had an arched passage and notably thick walls. By the time later researchers examined the site, the building itself was gone and Moran's Drapery occupied the plot. What remained were two stones from a chamfered limestone arch, a type of arch where the edges are cut away at an angle to create a bevelled profile, with a combined span of 1.5 metres. A third stone, documented as recently as 1918, has since disappeared. The more unusual survivor is a six-sided stone kept at the rear of the property. One face carries a panel of lierne rib vaulting, a decorative form of vaulting in which short ribs connect the main structural ribs in a star or net-like pattern, more commonly associated with church interiors than with anything domestic. The edges of the stone are bordered with cable work in relief, a twisted rope-like decorative motif, and there is a boss at the top. On the back, a mortice, the socket cut into stone or wood to receive a corresponding tenon joint, suggests the piece was fitted into a larger structure. What that structure was remains unknown.

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