Standing stone, Rinn Chonaill, Co. Kerry

Co. Kerry |

Stone Monuments

Standing stone, Rinn Chonaill, Co. Kerry

In the pastureland at the foot of Reenconnell, on the Dingle Peninsula, a prehistoric standing stone has been quietly doing double duty as a cattle scratching post.

The stone, an orthostat, meaning a single upright slab set deliberately into the ground, measures 1.5 metres high, 1.25 metres wide, and up to 0.6 metres thick. It is oriented northeast to southwest, a alignment that recurs among standing stones across Ireland and may reflect astronomical or territorial significance, though in this case no specific purpose has been established. What makes it quietly remarkable is not its size or drama but its obscurity: it had not been formally recorded prior to its inclusion in J. Cuppage's 1986 archaeological survey of the Corca Dhuibhne, the Dingle Peninsula.

The landscape around it is characteristic of this part of Kerry, gently sloping ground interrupted by rock outcrops, with the broad valley of the Milltown river and its tributaries opening out to the south. Standing stones of this kind were erected throughout prehistoric Ireland, most commonly during the Bronze Age, though precise dating is rarely straightforward without excavation. They appear singly and in groups, sometimes near burial sites, sometimes along routeways, sometimes for reasons that remain entirely unclear. This particular example belongs to no recorded complex or cluster; it simply stands there, unclassified beyond its basic description, facing the valley below.

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