Hut site, Letter, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, Letter, Co. Kerry

On the eastern slope of Beenmore in County Kerry, at between 250 and 260 metres above sea level, a cluster of ancient drystone hut sites sits in boggy upland pasture now used only by sheep.

Most visitors to this part of Kerry never come up this high, and the structures themselves offer little visual drama: walls that have collapsed to roughly half a metre in height, a circular interior just three metres across, and no traceable entrance. What makes this particular hut quietly arresting is its situation within a broader complex, several related structures scattered across a ridge, divided by a tributary of the Behy river, with some lying to the north of the stream and others to the south.

Drystone construction, which uses no mortar and relies entirely on the careful stacking and fitting of stones, was common across early Irish settlement and pastoral activity, and structures of this kind are found throughout the uplands of the Iveragh and Dingle peninsulas. This example has an internal diameter of three metres and walls one metre thick, the thickness being largely a consequence of collapse rather than original design. It sits nine metres north-east of a neighbouring hut site, and a further hut lies just six metres to its west, though rushes growing across the ground between them reduce how clearly one can be seen from the other. The wider landscape orientates the complex: Coomnacronia Lake lies roughly 625 metres to the south-south-west, Drung Hill rises to the north, and on clear days the view north-east opens down the valley past Curra Hill all the way to Dingle Bay, with Seefin Mountain visible to the east.

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Pete F
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