First recorded by the Archaeological Survey of County Donegal in the early 1980s, this ancient cooking site appeared as a grassed mound measuring roughly 14 metres northwest to southeast and 10 metres across its width, rising about a metre at its highest point. The southern and western edges had already been disturbed by field wall construction, whilst a distinctive U-shaped depression, its mouth spanning three metres, opened towards this same wall. Fire-shattered stones scattered around the base offered telltale signs of the site’s original purpose, and its position just three metres from a north-south running stream in wetland, flanked by drier pasture on higher ground, made it an ideal location for Bronze Age cooking activities.

The site’s peaceful existence was disrupted in 2016 when ground works and quarrying damaged significant portions of the mound; the north, east, and south sides were partially excavated, whilst the western section disappeared beneath a three-metre heap of displaced soil. This disturbance revealed something remarkable: fragments of an ancient wickerwork feature protruding from the damaged eastern face. A rescue excavation conducted between October and November 2016 uncovered the western side of a wattle-lined trough, though its eastern portion had been destroyed. The original structure consisted of a circular or oval pit cut into natural peat, ingeniously lined with vertical stakes and horizontal wicker sails, with moss packed between the wickerwork and pit walls. This clever construction allowed groundwater to seep through from the underlying peat whilst the moss acted as a natural filter, creating a self-filling water trough perfect for the hot-stone cooking method that gave fulachtaí fia their name.

Despite the damage, a substantial crescent-shaped portion of the burnt stone mound survives, measuring approximately 10.3 metres north to south and 6.2 metres east to west. The U-shaped depression noted in the 1980s remains visible on the western side and may conceal a second trough beneath. Rather than fully excavating the site, archaeologists recorded the exposed layers of heat-shattered granite and quartz stones, took samples for environmental and dating analysis, then carefully preserved the monument in situ. Today, the fulacht fia rests beneath protective geotextile membrane and topsoil, a hidden reminder of Bronze Age life in this steep-sided Donegal valley, where our ancestors once gathered to cook communal meals using hot stones and filtered spring water.