Standing stone, Gullaba, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Stone Monuments
On the lower northern slopes of Gullaba Hill in County Kerry, a single standing stone rises just over two metres from a low knoll in undulating pasture.
Rectangular in section and pointed at the top, it measures roughly 85 centimetres by 65 centimetres at the base and is aligned along a north-south axis, a deliberate orientation that was common in prehistoric standing stones, though its precise original purpose remains unknown. Recently planted trees now crowd the surrounding area, lending the spot a slightly enclosed quality that it would not have had when the stone was first raised.
The stone was recorded in the 1930s by Captain D. B. O'Connell of the Kerry Archaeological Society, who noted a pillar stone in this townland standing about five feet high. That measurement, roughly 1.52 metres, is somewhat shorter than the 2.1 metres documented in more recent survey work, though it is generally considered to be the same stone. What makes its setting particularly interesting is its proximity to a cluster of other archaeological features: enclosures and a hut site lie approximately 70 metres to the west, while a burnt spread, an area of scorched or fire-reddened material that often indicates prehistoric cooking or industrial activity, sits about 40 metres to the north-west. The standing stone does not exist in isolation, then, but as one element within a wider landscape of past settlement and activity on the hill's lower slopes.