Fulacht fia

The National Monuments Service's description

In commonage, located in a natural steep-sided basin of water-logged peat. There is another fulacht fia (MA085-007002-) c. 50m to SSW, and there is an enclosure (MA085-063----) and a field system (MA085-037----) c. 50m to W on top of the ridge bordering the peat basin.
This fulacht fia was partly excavated (94E0156) in 1994 (King 2007, 268-276). It consists of two contiguous mounds of heat-shattered stone and charcoal, roughly U-shaped in plan, flanking a hollow area open to SE which constitutes the trough area.
Excavation showed two phases of activity in the trough area. The earliest phase consisted of a stone formation of upright and flat slabs, possibly a collapsed structure or alternatively a working surface on the soft, wet underlying peat. This feature was later incorporated into a rather haphazard arrangement of stones and long, narrow pieces of wood, both worked and unworked, which may have been the remains of a trough. Persistent water-logging at the site limited excavation and prevented a full understanding of the sequence of events in the trough area. A radiocarbon sample from charcoal in the mound produced a date of 3660+/-33 BP indicating usage of the site in the Early Bronze Age in the period 2137-1945 BC (King 2007, 271).

Compiled by: Jane O'Shaughnessy

Date of upload: 7 September 2018

References

Gosling, P., Manning, C. and Waddell, J. (eds.) 2007 New Survey of Clare Island, Volume 5: Archaeology. Dublin, Royal Irish Academy.

King, P. 2007 The archaeological excavation of an enclosure (Cat. No. 76), a boundary wall (Cat. No. 192) and a fulacht fia (Cat. No. 57) at Lecarrow. In Gosling, Manning and Waddell (eds.) 2007 New Survey of Clare Island, Volume 5: Archaeology, Royal Irish Academy, Dublin, 267-289.