Hut site, Killogrone, Co. Kerry

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Settlement Sites

Hut site, Killogrone, Co. Kerry

On the Ordnance Survey maps of south Kerry, a symbol marks what is labelled a sheepfold in the townland of Killogrone.

The cartographic confidence is not matched on the ground. The site, along with a related enclosure in a neighbouring townland, lies inside a forestry plantation, and attempts to locate it have come to nothing. The trees have simply swallowed it.

Before the plantation closed over this corner of the Iveragh Peninsula, a researcher named Henry visited and recorded what she found: rubble foundations of several round enclosures, structures she identified as possible sheepfolds, and the remains of old field boundaries running nearby. That was in 1957. Round enclosures of this kind are a familiar feature of the Irish upland landscape, used variously over the centuries for sheltering livestock or, in earlier periods, as the foundations of simple hut structures. The OS mapmakers appear to have settled on sheepfold as their interpretation, though Henry's notes leave the question of precise function somewhat open. What she described was, at minimum, evidence of organised agricultural activity, a small worked landscape complete with boundaries and enclosures, now buried under commercial forestry.

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