Hut site, Cloonfeagh, Co. Clare
Co. Clare |
Settlement Sites
On a drumlin in County Clare, the faint outline of a small structure survives inside the earthwork of an early medieval rath.
The remains take the form of a D-shaped platform, roughly 6.6 metres east to west and 6 metres north to south, with the flat edge running along the southern side. A low, grass-covered stone footing, only about half a metre wide and barely 20 centimetres above the surrounding ground, traces its perimeter. It is the kind of feature that rewards attention precisely because it offers so little at a glance.
A rath, sometimes called a ringfort, is a type of enclosed farmstead common across Ireland during the early medieval period, roughly the fifth to twelfth centuries. They typically consist of one or more circular earthen banks surrounding a central living area, and many would have contained timber or stone structures for sleeping, storage, and daily work. What makes this particular site worth pausing over is its position: the hut sits not just within the rath but at the highest point of a drumlin, one of those smooth, rounded hills shaped by glacial deposition during the last Ice Age. The elevated position would have made practical sense for drainage and visibility, and the deliberate placement of the hut at the centre of the enclosure suggests it may have been the primary dwelling rather than an ancillary building.