Enclosure

The National Monuments Service's description

A souterrain was reported Dr. Michael Connolly, County Archaeologist, Kerry Co. Co., on June 3rd 2015 by a walker who had seen the opening above Camp Beach (ITM 47032 610294) while walking his dog. The opening to the souterrain measures 0.7m by 0.5m and drops 0.45m into a low narrow passage on average 0.7m by 0.6m. The passage is constructed of dry stone walling and roofed with stone lintels. It runs to the south for approximately 23m in a relatively straight line but the passage is very narrow and low making exploration of the passage difficult. The passage is further narrowed at two points along its visible length through the use of roofing lintels that project into the passage creating in effect a creep like feature. There are lots of stone cobbles on the floor of the passage clearly derived from the adjacent shore. The exposed opening is at the extreme northern end of the souterrain as a water derived gully has developed outside the opening to the north and the curved end of the passage can be seem in the gully.
An Seabhac recorded a souterrain associated with this small promontory fort known as An Dún but no trace of the souterrain was visible during the course of the Dingle Peninsula Archaeological Survey in the early 1980s (Cuppage et al. 1986). Nonetheless this is unlikely to be associated with this promontory for given the distance between the two monuments and the fact that the passage runs north-south and not towards the west. It may however be the souterrain reported to An Seabhac by locals in the 1930s, which they believed to be associated with An Dún.
A review of aerial photography suggest that there was an unrecorded enclosure approximately 27m to the north of the souterrain site and this would be ideally placed to have been associated with the passage.

Compiled by: Matt Kelleher 4 June 2015

References

Cuppage, J. 1986 Corca Dhuibhne. Dingle Peninsula archaeological survey. Ballyferriter. Oidhreacht Chorca Dhuibhne.

Seabhac, An. 1939 Triocha-Céad Chorca Dhuibhne. Dublin.