Cloonsharragh, Kerry, SW Ireland
Location 52.247359 -10.17844
Three stones that align with the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset. The alignment is not precise but the stones appearance give the impression that there may have been some slippage on the slope as they are heavy looking and the weather here is very wet. A prone fourth stone looks as though it may have been part of the row. See the photo below.
Dated - unknown
Horizon view - middle and distant hills (the Brandon group of mountains)
Horizon orientation - This stone row is aligned to midsummer sun rise between the intersection of the Glenderry hills and midwinter sun rise over the Brandon mountains.
Structure orientation - the stone row aligns on the f midsummer sunrise and the midwinter sunset. See photographs below.
Cloonsharragh Stone Row consists of a structure of three stones in a line located on the North side of the Brandon group of mountains.
There is a limited area of good farming land along the coast here that could have supported an ancient small settled community of a few hundreds - sufficient to build the stone structure.
There appears to be no stones locally of this size, so the three stones could have been brought down from the nearby Brandon group of mountains where rocky areas can be found. If so this must have represented considerable effort for a small rural community, which indicates that the structure was of some importance. It does not appear to have any function as a livestock pen or fortification, and the simple design would not make an impressive sacred site. The only practical function seems to be as a pointer towards the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset, which would be of importance to a pre-technology rural society.
The area (the Dingle Peninsular) is very isolated, so the early farmers would need their own sunrise locator until comparatively recent times, up to the last few centuries. This would explain why the stones are still upright.
