Kiln - corn-drying

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated in a slight fold in a gently undulating landscape, with rock outcrop close to the surface at the S edge of the hollow. Archaeological testing (04E0917) by J. Roynane (2005) at Testing Area 10 of Contract 4 of the M3 motorway identified (excavations.ie 2004:1270) archaeological material that was fully excavated (E003141) in November and December 2006 by E. Lyne (2011) as Kilmainham 1A when an L-shaped area of 7000 square metres was opened. The excavated area was just SW of the multi-period complex of Kilmainham 1C. Two Neolithic structures, a Bronze Age hut-site, a prehistoric boundary and a flat cemetery, were recorded as well as an early medieval cereal-drying kiln and a long ditch that extended into Kilmainham 1C (excavations.ie 2007:1334).

This feature was just 2.5m N of the site of Structure 1. It has a figure-of-eight shape (dims 2.27m NE-SW; 1.3m NW-SE; D 0.55m) with an oxidized base of red clay from in situ burning. The charcoal-rich silty sand above this included fragments of burnt bone, including a tooth of sheep/goat, while the remainder of the fills were backfill. A large amount of carbonised cereals including wheat, barley and oats was present, but smaller quantities of wild species such as goosefoot, black bindweed, water pepper and knotgrass were also present in the primary deposit. A charred hazelnut shell from this layer returned a C14 date of 423-552 cal. AD (UBA 12104). (Lyne 2011, 31-2)

See the attached site plan adapted from Lyne (2011, fig. 7)

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 16 March 2022