Hut site, Cill Buaine, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, Cill Buaine, Co. Kerry

On the lower south-western slopes of Knocknaskereighta, a hill on the Iveragh Peninsula in County Kerry, the grass has been quietly burying a building for a very long time.

What survives is the sod-covered outline of a roughly constructed rectangular hut, its foundations still legible beneath the pasture, along with two probable hut platforms situated a short distance to the west. None of it is dramatic to look at; this is archaeology that rewards patient attention rather than immediate spectacle.

The site sits within the townland of Cill Buaine, a name that gestures towards an early ecclesiastical presence, though the hut itself is not directly connected to any known religious foundation. Hut platforms of this kind, essentially levelled or cut terraces on a slope that once provided a stable floor for a simple structure, are found across upland and marginal land throughout Kerry and the wider south-west of Ireland. They are typically associated with seasonal or pastoral occupation, the kind of temporary or semi-permanent shelter used by people working livestock on rougher ground. The rectangular form here, rather than the circular plan more common in prehistoric contexts, may suggest a medieval or early modern date, though without excavation such a reading remains tentative. The site was recorded as part of the comprehensive archaeological survey of the Iveragh Peninsula compiled by A. O'Sullivan and J. Sheehan and published by Cork University Press in 1996.

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