Hut site, Canburrin, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On the lower northern slopes of Beenduff, in a bog now colonised by conifers, the remains of a small stone structure protrude just above the surface of the ground.
That last detail is what makes it quietly remarkable: the bog, rather than swallowing the site entirely, has preserved and partially exposed it, leaving a few courses of drystone walling still legible to anyone who knows what to look for.
The structure is D-shaped in plan, measuring roughly two metres east to west, and was built using drystone construction, a technique in which stones are carefully stacked and fitted without mortar, relying on weight and placement alone for stability. The western side is the best-preserved element, a straight wall running about three metres north to south and still standing to nearly a metre in height. This western wall also functioned as the eastern boundary of a separate enclosure nearby, suggesting that whatever activity took place here was part of a small cluster of related structures rather than an isolated building. The collapsed drystone wall that defines the curved eastern portion of the hut survives to only around thirty centimetres in height, its stones now spread and sunken, but the outline remains traceable.