Flat cemetery

The National Monuments Service's description

Located at what was probably the crest of an E-facing slope overlooking the valley of the River Liffey before it was flooded and turned into the Pollaphuca reservoir. From the Cassini edition of the OS map the location is close to a steep cliff down to the Liffey. The water of the reservoir has eroded away the topsoil and a lot of the subsoil on a fairly level plateau. Judging by the little cliff around the normal edge of the full reservoir about 30-40cm of subsoil has been removed at the edge of the shore where wave action would perhaps erode more of the soil, but the topsoil and some amount of subsoil has been removed from the extensive ground exposed now at the SE edge of Burgage More townland. The cursus (WI005-124----) is in full view at the top of a hill to the E.
After consultation with Pauline Gleeson and Sean Kirwan of the NMS it was decided to excavate the two pits. The subsoil is hard yellow clay and when it is cleaned back the pits are visible as softer brown soil with plentiful amounts of charcoal and burnt bone visible as white flecks. The white fecks are not to be confused with the white flecks of bird droppings which are also present. The first pit identified and excavated was oval (dims 23cm x 18cm; D 10cm) and its entire contents were removed for sieving. No pottery was present that we could see but it contained a soft brown soil and charcoal. The second, western, pit was smaller (dims 20cm x 18cm; D 5cm) and much less soil was recovered from it, but bone and charcoal was present.

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien based on details provided by Michael Moore

Date of upload: 4 October 2018