The name is unassuming, almost administrative, yet it points to something genuinely ancient and quietly puzzling in the landscape. A burnt spread is typically the remains of a fulacht fiadh, a type of prehistoric cooking site found in great numbers across Ireland, usually dating from the Bronze Age. These sites are recognised by a characteristic mound of heat-shattered, fire-cracked stone, dark and crumbly from repeated heating and quenching in water-filled troughs. They tend to appear in low-lying or waterlogged ground, near streams or springs, and their distribution across the Irish countryside is so dense that they represent one of the most common monument types on the island.