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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Burial

Raffin, County Meath, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Burial, Raffin, 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
Raffin
County
Meath
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Not indicated
Latest-edition OS map
Not indicated
Coordinates
53.78863, -6.75638
SMR number
ME011-040008-

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)
  • 1799 · 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

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).
A large subrectangular pit (dims 2.15m plus N-S; 1.1-1.3m E-W; D 035-0.45m plus) in the N interior of the visible enclosure was marked by a globular stone (diam. of base 1.5m; diam. of top 0.94m; visible H 0.63m) on the surface. At the S end of the pit the top and front parts of a human skull and some animal bones on a bed of charcoal were beneath a layer of reddened clay, possibly ochre. This was below a sandy clay, which in turn was beneath a burnt stone layer. The skull produced a C14 date of 100 BC to AD 130 (Newman 1993d, 22). (Newman 1993; 1993c, 16-17)

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload; 10 April, 2019

References

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 Unpublished report, Author

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

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

Newman, C. 1993 The cult of the human head. Archaeology Ireland 7 (3), 22.

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
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