Hut site, Drombohilly, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Settlement Sites
In the rough hill pasture of Drombohilly, a low oval outline protrudes just above the surface of the bog.
It is easy to miss, and that is part of what makes it worth knowing about. What remains of this small hut site is a collapsed drystone wall, a building technique using stones stacked without mortar, that still traces an oval roughly 4.2 metres from north to south and 3.1 metres from east to west. The wall survives to a height of only 0.4 metres, its stones long since tumbled, yet the footprint is clear enough to read.
The site sits on a west-facing slope at the head of a valley, and whoever built the structure paid careful attention to the gradient beneath them. The eastern portion of the interior floor was cut approximately 0.3 metres down into the hillside, while the western portion was left raised, the two adjustments working together to produce something approaching a level living surface. It is a small, practical piece of engineering, the kind that leaves no written record but speaks plainly about the people who carried it out. The bog has since crept up around the remains, preserving the outline while obscuring the broader landscape in which the hut once functioned.