Hut site, Baile An Ásaigh, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Settlement Sites

Hut site, Baile An Ásaigh, Co. Kerry

On the southern slopes of Ballysitteragh mountain on the Dingle Peninsula, two small circular stone huts sit joined together in the ruins of what was once a self-contained dwelling place.

What makes them quietly remarkable is the construction method: drystone corbelling, a technique in which flat stones are laid in gradually overlapping rings, each course projecting slightly inward over the one below, until the gap at the top can be closed without any mortar or timber framework. It is one of the oldest building methods in the world, and on this exposed mountain shoulder it produced structures that, even in their ruined state, still read clearly as rooms.

Each hut measures 3.3 metres in diameter and the surviving walls stand to about 0.8 metres. The northern hut retains a detail that elevates the site beyond a simple shelter: a lintelled wall-cupboard, a small recess covered by a flat spanning stone, built directly into the wall fabric. That a person living in a circular stone hut of just over three metres across still wanted a dedicated storage niche says something about how deliberately these spaces were organised. Old field boundaries survive in the surrounding area, suggesting that the huts formed part of a wider agricultural landscape rather than an isolated retreat. The site was recorded and described by J. Cuppage in the 1986 Corca Dhuibhne archaeological survey of the Dingle Peninsula, which documented the remarkable concentration of early remains across this part of County Kerry.

The huts sit on a steep southern slope, which means the approach involves some climbing, and the mountain terrain is characteristically rough underfoot. The surrounding field traces are easiest to read when vegetation is low, and the corbelled stonework of the walls, modest in height as it now is, rewards a close look rather than a distant one.

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