Hut site, Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, Cloghera More, Co. Kerry

On the north-facing lower slopes of Mullaghanattin, one of the Reeks-adjacent peaks of south-west Kerry, a small D-shaped enclosure sits on a boggy terrace in rough pasture.

It is easy to walk past without a second glance, but the geometry of this modest structure repays attention. The builders did not simply stack stones on flat ground; they worked with the gradient, cutting the northern portion of the interior roughly 0.3 metres down into the hillside and raising the southern portion about 0.2 metres, so that the floor inside was effectively levelled despite the slope. That kind of deliberate earthworking, achieved without mortar or machinery, suggests a degree of planning that goes well beyond a casual shelter thrown up in an afternoon.

The structure itself is defined by a drystone wall, the technique of building in dry-laid stone without mortar, that survives to around 0.45 metres in height and 0.8 metres in thickness. The overall footprint measures roughly 3.5 metres north to south, with a straight southern side running about 2.4 metres. A narrow entrance, just 0.45 metres wide, opens to the north-east. The D-shape, with its flat southern side and curved northern arc, is a form found at hut sites across upland Ireland, and while no date is given for this particular example, such structures are broadly associated with seasonal pastoral activity, when people moved livestock to higher ground during summer months, a practice known in Ireland as transhumance or, in its Gaelic form, booleying. The site sits within bog and rough pasture on ground that would have been more accessible in drier conditions, either historically or seasonally.

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Pete F
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