House - medieval

The National Monuments Service's description

Located on the NE slope of a mound/sandhill (MA023-014003), traditionally known as Bailey Mór.
This subrectangular house of drystone construction was excavated in 1939 (Henry 1945, 137-140; House A). Excavation determined that the walls were constructed by lining a foundation pit with upright slabs above which the walls rose in slightly corbelled courses of horizontally-laid slabs. The walls were thin and in poor condition, with little of the upper horizontal courses intact. There was a door in the NE wall, and a window at the N end of the same wall. A large slab leaning against the wall adjacent to the door was found to fit the inner frame of hte the doorway and Henry postulated that it may have been used as a door. A blackened, soot-filled opening piercing the SW wall may have served as a flue for an elaborate two-phase, stone-and clay-lined hearth in the centre of the room. In the SE corner of the room, upright slabs partition off an area interpreted as a space for sleeping.
Finds recovered during the excavation included a possible iron knife, a perforated bone pin, bone points, a stone spindle whorl, a disc of whalebone, a broken stone quern, a hollow sheep’s horn and a flat piece of schist. Animal and fish bones and sea shells were also recovered.
No remains of the house are now visible at ground surface. Two conjoined houses (MA023-014007-; MA023-014008-) are situated a few meters to NW.
National Monument in state ownership (no. 379)

Compiled by: Jane O’Shaughnessy

Date of upload: 17 April 2023

References

Henry, F. 1945 Remains of the Early Christian Period on Inishkea North, Co. Mayo. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 75, 127-55.