House - Bronze Age

The National Monuments Service's description

On level ground in pasture on the plateau of a gentle rise. Excavated in 2007 in advance of the N9/N10 Kilcullen to Waterford road improvement scheme (Licence no. E3853). A circular house (diam. 5m) represented by six post-holes in a semicircular arrangement with enclosing curvilinear ditches that may have been drip gullies. A modern field boundary cut through the centre of the remains in an NE-SW direction. An oblong pit to the S of the house may represent an entrance porch. A post-hole and pit were located in the interior but their function is unknown. A number of pits were identified outside the enclosing gully and may have been waste pits. One pit contained sherds of a middle Bronze Age domestic vessel. Charcoal from one of the ditches yielded a radiocarbon date of 1606-1439 cal BC (UBA-131067). (Whitty 2010, 248, no. 937; Whitty and Coughlan 2012)

Compiled by: Mary Tunney

Date of upload: 6 December 2013

References

Whitty, Y. and Coughlan, T. 2012 N9/N10 Kilcullen to Waterford Scheme: Phase 4 - Knocktopher to Powerstown. Final report. Ministerial Direction: A032. Site name: AR095, Dunbell Big 2. Registration No. E3853. Unpublished report submitted to the National Monuments Service, Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Dublin.

Whitty, Y. 2010 Holdenstown. In I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 2007: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 248, no. 937. Bray. Wordwell.