Standing stone, Cloghanecarhan, Co. Kerry

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Stone Monuments

Standing stone, Cloghanecarhan, Co. Kerry

On the southern slopes of Foilclogh mountain in County Kerry, a prehistoric standing stone has been quietly absorbed into a field boundary, its ancient purpose now subordinated to the thoroughly practical business of keeping livestock in place.

This kind of quiet indignity is not uncommon among Ireland's standing stones, upright slabs erected during the Bronze Age or earlier, whose original significance, whether as territorial markers, ritual focal points, or astronomical alignments, has long since dissolved into the landscape.

The stone itself is a narrow, irregular slab, tapering unevenly towards the top and inclining slightly to the south. It stands just under two metres at its tallest point, and is relatively slender, measuring roughly half a metre wide and only fifteen centimetres thick at the base. Its orientation runs roughly ENE to WSW. The position is a striking one: high on the hillside, with views down towards the mouth of the River Inny to the south-west, the kind of placement that recurs often enough among standing stones to suggest that commanding outlooks over water or valley entrances may have mattered to whoever chose the spot.

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