Ringfort (Rath), Tullig, Co. Kerry

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Ringforts

Ringfort (Rath), Tullig, Co. Kerry

At the centre of this Kerry ringfort, half-buried under centuries of accumulated sod, sits the collapsed remains of a circular hut.

It is an unusual detail. Many raths across Ireland have had their interiors cleared or disturbed beyond recognition, yet here the inner structure survives, quietly waiting to be noticed beneath the grass. The enclosure itself is oval rather than the more typical round form, measuring roughly 29 metres across its longer axis, and it sits on a natural terrace above the Ferta river on the Iveragh Peninsula.

A rath is an earthen ringfort, a type of enclosed farmstead built and occupied predominantly during the early medieval period in Ireland, roughly between the fifth and twelfth centuries. This one is univallate, meaning it has a single enclosing bank rather than the multiple concentric rings found at more elaborate sites. The external fosse, a defensive ditch encircling the bank, survives best along the southern side, where it reaches 2.4 metres across its base and is partly defined by a modern field boundary. The bank above it rises to a maximum of 3 metres, which gives some sense of the original effort involved in its construction. An original entrance gap survives on the south-east side at 1.75 metres wide, though much eroded; a second gap on the north-west appears to be a later, relatively modern breach rather than an original feature. Inside, the circular hut structure measures approximately 6.3 metres by 5.8 metres internally, with a collapsed wall averaging 2 metres thick and a narrow entrance gap facing east. The site was documented by Aidan O'Sullivan and Jerry Sheehan in their 1996 archaeological survey of the Iveragh Peninsula, published by Cork University Press.

What makes the location particularly striking is the field of view it commands. From this terrace the entire Ferta valley opens up, running from Teermoyle mountain to the east all the way to Valentia Harbour to the south-west. Whoever chose this ground chose it deliberately, and that calculation still reads clearly in the landscape today.

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