Settlement cluster

The National Monuments Service's description

On a gentle NW-facing slope, in pasture, with a boggy area immediately N and W of the fields with earthworks.

According to Carrigan (1905, vol. 4, 82-3), the church, ‘stood in “the old town” of Newchurch, near the bounds of Ballygown (Ponsonby). There was a village in “the old town” till about 1850, when the tenants were evicted and their houses all levelled. Up to the date just mentioned, part of the church remained and served as the gable of a barn belonging to a man named Michael Connolly. The site of the village and church has been since ploughed up, and is now a rich pasture field. The ancient name of this church was Killiny. In a document of the year 1446, already given, the townland in which it stood is called Kyllyne, or Killiny, of Howellyscastell (i.e. Castlehale), to distinquish it from Killiny beside Kells, where there was another ancient church’. 

On the 1st ed. OS 6-inch map (1839) a settlement cluster is indicated in the W side of the townland, immediately E of a ringfort (KK035-003----). This field has been reclaimed with no visible trace of the settlement. Some of the stones from the clearance of this settlement were dumped on and adjacent to the ringfort, including a boulder used as a sharpening stone, with much indications of wear. A lane is indicated running N to this settlement from the main road between Tullaghought and Hugginstown. There is a suggestion on the 1st ed. map that the lane continued to run NW of the cluster, though only the E side is indicated and survives as a field boundary. In the field immediately E of this field boundary, and in neighbouring fields to the N and E, there are a number of earthworks visible on satellite imagery and on the ground which suggests that a medieval settlement was located N and NE of the settlement cluster indicated on the 1st ed. map.

 

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly