Habitation site

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on the top of a small knoll of fen-peat on Clonava Island which is now on reclaimed grassland which was formerly the flood-plain of the Inny River 80m to N and Lough Derravaragh 500m to E. The Mesolithic shoreline of the lake was exposed after the Inny River was drained in the 1960s resulting in the lowering of the water level on Lough Derravaragh. Another Mesolithic chert scatter (WM006-025----) was also exposed 200m to the NE. The findspot of 5 chert Bann flakes, points, and some cores by Dr. J. Raftery of the NMI who brought the find to the attention of Professor Frank Mitchell (Mitchell 1972, 160-1; NMI Reg. No. 1968, 199-205). On the 1837 ed. OS 6-inch map the location of this lithic scatter was situated on a small headland adjacent to the NW shoreline Lough Derravaragh where the Inny River enters the lake. Clonava Island is a knoll of calcite mudstone with numerous bands of chert. The 'island' appears to have been an attractive settlement site in prehistoric times. The chert at Lake Derravaragh has an unusual banded structure and disintegrates easily on exposure to the weather. The site referred to as Site No. 1 consisted of a 4m square area that was excavated by Professor Frank Mitchell of Trinity College Dublin who uncovered the remains of a settlement site consisting of heaps of chert and stone on the floodplain of the river along with a scatter of charcoal and struck chert. Two scatters of loose chert debitage were revealed on the top and flank of the knoll which were removed by excavation. A second or middle layer of charcoal and chert debitage was found beneath the fen peat, the third and base layer was found on the undisturbed fen-peat and consisted of charcoal, wood, hazel-nuts, chert implements and debitage, and angular fragments of burnt sandstone. In the centre of the excavated site there was a concentrated thicker mass of chert debitage, which suggested the debris of a knapping site. C14 dating of charcoal gave the date of 5360 +- 110 BP. Recent re-dating of carbonised hazelnut shells from the lowest level of the site returned two dates for this site that are distinct at two sigma: 4313–4045 cal BC (5327±37 BP, UBA-8105) and 4680–4458 cal BC (5706±37 BP, UBA-8106) (Little 2009, 131). Today there are no surface remains visible of this settlement site. The distinctive chert from this site described as 'festoon' chert appears to have been quarried from Knockeyon Hill (WM012-209----) where natural outcrops of this distinctive type of chert can be found (O'Sullivan et. al. 2007, 38; Little 2014, 8).

Compiled by: Frank Coyne & Caimin O'Brien

Date of upload: 2 February 2017

References

O'Sullivan, A., Little, A. and Parkes, M. 2007 The power of stone. Archaeology Ireland 21 (3), 36-9.

Little, A 2014 Clonava Island revisited: a story of cooking, plants and re-occupation during the Irish Late Mesolithic. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 114, 1-21.

Little, A. 2009 The island the hill. Extracting scales of sociability from a Mesolithic chert quarry. In N. Finlay, S. McCartan, N. Milner and C. Wickham Jones (eds) From bann flakes to bushmills; papers in honour of Professor Peter Woodman, 129-38. Oxford. Oxford Books.

Mitchell, G.F. 1972 Some ultimate Larnian sites at Lake Derravaragh, Co. Westmeath. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 102, 160-73.