Hut site, Maulagowna, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, Maulagowna, Co. Kerry

On a north-west facing slope above the valley of Lough Inchiquin in south-west Kerry, a small rectangular structure sits almost invisibly among rough hill pasture.

It measures just 1.35 metres north to south and 1.1 metres east to west, its walls of dry-laid stone now collapsed to around 0.75 metres in height. The entrance, a narrow gap of half a metre, faces north-east. What makes it quietly remarkable is a detail of practical ingenuity: the south-east portion of the interior was deliberately cut into the hillside to level the floor against the natural slope of the ground. Whoever built it understood the terrain well enough to shape their shelter around it.

This is a hut site, the term used by archaeologists to describe the remains of a simple single-roomed structure, typically associated with seasonal pastoral activity such as transhumance, the practice of moving livestock to upland grazing in summer months. The walls were built in drystone technique, meaning no mortar was used, the stones relying entirely on their own weight and arrangement for stability. The interior is now filled with loose rubble, and the whole structure adjoins the south-east side of a relict field boundary, a remnant of an older agricultural landscape that has long since gone out of use. A second hut site lies approximately 20 metres to the south, suggesting this was not an isolated dwelling but part of a small cluster of activity on the hillside, people and animals working the same patch of upland together, at least for a season.

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Pete F
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