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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

House - Neolithic

Newtown (Kells Lower By., Kilmainham ED), County Meath, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of House - Neolithic, Newtown, County Meath, with a pin at the register's coordinates
Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915), covering this location. Courtesy of the National Library of Scotland. The pin is ours, placed from the register's coordinates.

The record

Townland
Newtown (Kells Lower By., Kilmainham ED)
County
Meath
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Not indicated
Latest-edition OS map
Not indicated
Coordinates
53.84937, -6.85492
SMR number
ME005-105----

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

4 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1636 map "Vltoniae Orientalis Pars" (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

Historical maps covering this location

  • 1636 · Vltoniae Orientalis Pars (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1869 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

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This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗

The National Monuments Service's description

Located on a rise towards the bottom of a NW-facing slope with a NW-SE stream c. 70m to the NW. An occupation level was identified by Claire Cotter on the line of a Bórd Gáis pipeline from Dunleer, Co. Lough, to Mullagh, Co. Cavan. It proved to be a Neolithic house with a Bronze Age phase, and was excavated (E000633) by Eoin Halpin. The house was rectangular (dims c. 10m x 6m) divided into two rooms, the E (dims 6m x 5.5m) with a doorway (Wth 1m) at E to the exterior and an internal doorway (Wth 1.5m) to the W room, the full extent of which did not survive and it may be that the W end was open. Three post-holes on the central axis and the load-bearing post-and-plank N and S walls supported the roof. A pit in the E room was filled with burnt stone and ash. Charcoal samples from the foundation trench produced calibrated determinations of 3971-3706 BC and 3936-3697 BC. A Bronze Age urn burial (ME005-105001-) was inserted in the floor of the E room. A gully (Wth c. 0.4m; D 0.1m) c. 2m to the E was C-shaped (dims c. 7m N-S; c. 6m plus E-W) and may have formed an associated enclosure. Just 2m N of this was an irregularly-shaped stony platform (dims c. 10m E-W; 5m N-S). Amongst the finds were sherds of Neolithic pottery. (Halpin and Gowen 1991; Halpin 1992; Gowen 1992)

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 5 September 2018

References

Halpin, E. and Gowen, M. 1991 Newtown: Neolithic house. In I. Bennett (ed.) Excavations 1991: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 37-9. Bray, Wordwell

Halpin, E. 1992 Pre gas-pipeline excavation at Newtown, Co. Meath. Archaeological Development Services, Licence: E000633. Unpublished report, Archaeological Development Services

Gowen, M. 1992 A neolithic house at Newtown. Archaeology Ireland 6, no. 2, 25-7.

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Sites and Monuments Record data: National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Record text is reproduced unchanged. National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
All House - Neolithic in Meath All County Meath records All Ireland Heritage registers Historical markers (US)National Register of Historic Places (US)
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