Souterrain

The National Monuments Service's description

This souterrain was revealed and subsequently filled in, in May 1982, by a mechanical excavator engaged in levelling a large field on a NW facing hillslope overlooking Trabeg and the Lispole valley. It consisted of a short section of passage, aligned ESE-WNW, linked by a short creep way to a rectangular chamber, aligned SSE-NNW. The passage was severely disturbed before inspection; some of its roofing slabs had collapsed inwards or been removed and, for the most part, only the upper courses of the drystone side walls were visible above the debris. It extended for at least 2m but could not be traced further E because of disturbance. It was generally aligned ESE-WNW, but a short distance from the entrance to the creepway it veered slightly to run ENE-WSW in line with this latter. It was 1.2m high at this point. The drystone-walled creepway was .65m long, .56m wide and .46m high and was roofed by 2 flat slabs. Midway along movement was further restricted by the presence of a porthole slab in the form of a neatly executed round arch cut into a slab c. 8 to l0cms thick. The creepway opened onto the N end of the E wall of the well-preserved chamber. This measured 3.55m in length, 1.3m in width and 1.3m in height. The walls were of dry-masonry construction and were slightly corbelled so that, at roof level, the chamber measured only 3 x .63m. There was no evident grading of stone size from floor to roof. Five large slabs covered the chamber; the northernmost had been removed thus providing the only access as both the creepway and chamber were waterlogged to a depth of .3m.

The above description is derived from J. Cuppage, ‘Corca Dhuibhne. Dingle Peninsula archaeological survey. Ballyferriter. Oidhreacht Chorca Dhuibhne’ (1986), no. 778. In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.

Date of upload: 7 August 2013