Ecclesiastical enclosure

The National Monuments Service's description

Test excavation was undertaken at the site by Dominic Delany in 1999 under licence no. 99E0214. The site (75m north-south by 45m) is adjacent to a church site (OF017-008----) and a graveyard (OF017-008002-). The existing graveyard boundary is D-shaped (maximum dimensions 55m east-west by 35m), and, according to the SMR files, 'there is a strong possibility that the 'D' is but the NNE half of an earlier circular enclosure'. Four test-trenches were mechanically excavated at locations corresponding to the footprint of the proposed development. The topsoil was a grey/brown, silty sand, 0.25m thick, overlying a yellowish/brown, silty sand subsoil. Outcrops of shattered limestone bedrock and grey, silty sand and gravel were encountered at a depth of 0.45m. A flat/round-bottomed ditch, 2.9m wide and 0.75m deep, was encountered in three of the trenches, and this appears to represent portions of a continuous feature, possibly an enclosure associated with the nearby ecclesiastical site. The ditch fill was a light brown, clayey sand with infrequent inclusions of angular cobbles and boulders, animal bone and molluscs. No datable finds were recovered from the fill. In Trench 4 a deposit of orange, sandy clay, 0.4m thick, was present on the north lip of the ditch, and this may represent part of a levelled internal bank. Similar spreads of orange, sandy clay were encountered in Trenches 2 and 3, albeit at some distance from the ditch. It should be noted that the ditch encountered during testing is not aligned with the circular enclosing element that forms the north boundary of the existing graveyard. A second, smaller ditch was encountered 6m south of the main ditch in Trench 4. It was 1.8m wide, narrowing to 0.8m at the limit of excavation, which was 0.4m below the top of the ditch. The fill was similar to that of the main ditch, and the two features are probably contemporary.

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien.

Date of upload: 23 May 2011