Field boundary, Ballymacthomas, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Ritual/Ceremonial

Field boundary, Ballymacthomas, Co. Kerry

In a large amalgamated field at Ballymacthomas in County Kerry, a low grass-covered bank curves gently across a limestone reef, barely distinguishable from the surrounding ground.

At its tallest it rises only thirty centimetres on its western face, dropping to twenty centimetres on the eastern side, and its width tapers from three metres at the northern end to two metres as it runs eastward. It would be easy to walk straight past it. What makes it worth pausing over is its relationship to a nearby mound: the bank traces a curve that maintains a consistent distance of roughly five metres from that feature, suggesting the two were not incidental to one another but part of some deliberate arrangement in the landscape.

The bank sits on the same limestone reef as a separate recorded site in the same field, and the stone content beneath its grassy surface implies it was constructed rather than formed by gradual accumulation. Its total length is approximately twenty metres. A survey of the Lee Valley area carried out by Michael Connolly in 1996 and 1997 recorded the feature and noted its proximity to the adjacent mound, though the precise function and date of the bank remain unspecified. Field boundaries of this kind can range considerably in age and purpose, from early medieval enclosures associated with farming or settlement to later land management features, and without excavation it is difficult to say more with confidence. What the careful geometry of its curve does suggest is that whoever built it was working in conscious relation to what was already there.

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Pete F
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