Hut site, Annagh More, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On the uplands of Annagh More in County Kerry, a small stone structure sits in a state of slow, dignified collapse.
It is barely larger than a wardrobe on the inside, with an internal diameter of just 1.2 metres, yet it was once enclosed by a separate outer wall forming a rough square of roughly 8 metres on each side. The combination of a tiny dwelling and a surrounding enclosure gives the site an oddly layered quality, as though whoever built it wanted both shelter and a defined boundary of some kind, even in such a remote place.
The hut is built in drystone, a technique that uses no mortar, relying instead on the careful placement of stones to create a stable structure. Its walls average around half a metre thick and stand about a metre high, which is likely only a fraction of their original height given the extensive collapse recorded around the site. A possible entrance faces south, though it has been partly blocked by fallen stone. The outer enclosure, whose walls were roughly coursed and once stood to perhaps 0.6 metres, is now largely tumbled as well. The site was documented by F. Coyne in a 2006 upland archaeological study covering Mount Brandon and the Paps, a survey that placed this small structure within a broader pattern of human activity across the Kerry highlands. That study, published by Kerry County Council in association with Aegis Archaeology, treated sites like this one as evidence of how extensively, and how quietly, people once organised their lives across ground that now appears largely empty.