The Ring of Kerry, one of Ireland's best-known tourist trails, is the largest peninsula and the most mountainous area in Ireland. The landscape is wild, dominated by mountain ranges cut by steep-sided valleys, cliffs, pockets, glens and narrow passes, a varied coast stretching from sandy bays at Ballinskelligs and Derrynane to high sea-cliffs and long sandy spits, and bogs found to the north and west of the mountains.

The archaeological sites suggested within lie along the Ring, ordered as if travelling in a clockwise direction from Cahersiveen to Killarney and circling the Iveragh Peninsula through Waterville, Sneem and Kenmare, providing a cross-section of the archaeological heritage of this part of Kerry.