Hut site

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on the summit of a N-S ridge. When first described in 1969 (SMR file) the earthwork presented as a large ring-barrow consisting of a circular grass-covered area (diam. 38.5m NW-SE) separated by a fosse (Wth of top 6.5m-7.5m; Wth of base 2-2.5m; int. D 0.6-0.7m; ext. D 0.8-0.9m) from an outer earthen bank (Wth of base 3-5.8m; ext. H 0.5m at NW to 1.2m at SE).
The earthwork was damaged in 1988 and a subsequent excavation (E000510) in the years 1989-1993 revealed a complex of features including a possible Neolithic house, two hut-sites, two enclosures, two timber circles, and a ritual burial. The circular hut-site of the Late Bronze Age (ME011-040005-) was superseded by an Early Iron Age circular hut-site (diam. 9m) defined by a plank palisade with an entrance at SE. It is at the centre of the earthwork enclosure (ME011-040----) and may be contemporary with it. A sample of wood from the palisade trench produced a C14 date of 30 BC to AD 670, corroborated by a La Téne fibula of second century AD date and two glass-beads. It had no evidence of a hearth or other signs of domestic use, but it was within a widely-spaced timber circle (ME011-040006-) of a ritual nature. The hut-site was partly beneath the NNW-SSE surface scarp across the earthwork, which is dated by radiocarbon to the early medieval. (Newman 1993b; 1993c, 14-16; 1993d, 23)

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 10 April, 2010

References

SMR file - Sites and monuments record files in the National Monuments Service, Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

Newman, C. 1993c Raffin Fort, Co. Meath Interim Report. Unpublished report, Author

Newman, C. 1993d Sleeping in Elysium. Archaeology Ireland, 7, 3, 20-24.

Newman, C. 1993b ‘Rafin Fort': Ritual enclosure. In I. Bennett (ed.) Excavations 1992: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 52. Wordwell, Bray