Hut site, Derrynafeana, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
On the western slopes of Slievanore in south-west Kerry, a small oval outline breaks through the surface of the bog almost apologetically.
It is barely five metres at its widest and three and a half metres across, yet those low courses of stone, still standing to around forty centimetres, describe the complete footprint of a dwelling, a hut that once had walls and a roof and someone living inside it.
The structure sits within a wider field system, suggesting this was not an isolated shelter but part of a broader agricultural landscape, one that has since been reclaimed by heather and gorse. The bog has risen around the walls over the centuries, leaving only the upper portions of the stonework visible above the surface. The wall itself is roughly eighty centimetres thick, typical of the dry-stone construction used in early vernacular building across Kerry, where the double skin of stone provided both structural stability and some insulation. The site is recorded by O'Sullivan and Sheehan in their 1996 survey of south-west Kerry, catalogued alongside dozens of similar remains that speak to a once-dense pattern of settlement across these upland margins. From the hut's position, the ground opens northwestward with views over Lough Acoose, a glacial ribbon lake in the shadow of Macgillycuddy's Reeks. Whether the people who built here chose the spot for that outlook, or simply for the shelter offered by the slope, is not something the stones can answer.
The interior of the hut is now entirely choked with gorse, which makes close inspection difficult, but the oval plan is still legible from a short distance. The surrounding grazing land is rough and unimproved, and the field boundaries of that older system remain faintly traceable in the landscape around it.