Fulacht fia

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on a S-facing slope in a gently undulating landscape. An area of sub-surface archaeological features was identified by Ian Russell in centre-line testing (02E0108) for the M4 Dublin to Galway motorway and set aside as Towlaght 1. It was completely excavated (02E1145) by Stephen Linnane who revealed a pond dating to c. 1700 and at a different location a spread of burnt mound material. This consisted of a black silty clay with broken and burnt stone and some charcoal content (dims c. 12m x c. 10m; max. T 0.4m) with a line of stones at its W edge providing a kerb. No troughs were revealed, and a date was not derived from the mound material, which is largely preserved outside the road-take. However, a small hearth (dims 0.7m x 0.58m; T 0.15m) c. 50m to the S and undoubtedly unrelated produced a C14 date of Cal AD 720-740. (Linnane 2004, 6-8)

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 13 August, 2019

References

Linnane, S. J. 2004 Towlaght 1. in Carlin, N., Clarke, L., and Fintan Walsh (eds) 2008 The Archaeology of Life and Death in the Boyne Floodplain: the linear landscape of the M4, Kinegad – Enfield - Kilcock motorway. NRA Scheme Monographs 2, vol. 2