Cist

The National Monuments Service's description

Cahill and Sikora (2011, 516-9) record that ‘in early February 1971 a short cist containing an inhumation and a bowl was discovered during ploughing operations on a farm near Castletown Geoghegan, Co. Westmeath. The capstone of the cist had been discovered about 0.2m below ground level when the point of plough caught in it and moved it approximately 0.4m out of position so that the south corner was exposed. The vessel was removed from the grave but the area was otherwise undisturbed. The site was reported to the NMI by Mrs Ruth Vandeleur, Wardenstown, Co. Westmeath. A one-day rescue excavation was undertaken by Dr Joseph Raftery. The human remains from the cist were examined by Professor C.A. Erskine. The cist was rectangular in plan, with its long axis running north-east/south-west. Internally it measured 1.18m long by 0.8m wide by 0.48m high. It was constructed of four thin edge-set slabs, with a maximum thickness of 0.lm. Each of the four slabs formed a wall of the cist. That at the south-western end was somewhat shorter than the others, and this was compensated for by positioning smaller stones on the end stone in order that the capstone would rest level on all four walls. All of the cist slabs were of limestone. There was no evidence for packing stones around the outside of the cist. A large, subrectangular capstone measuring 1.28m long by 1.24m wide by 0.12m thick sealed the cist. The floor of the cist was no-but was formed of hard, grey, packed soil. The grave contained a crouched inhumation burial of a male (1971:906) and a tripartite bowl. The cist was filled to a depth of about 0.15m with loose earth, which had apparently been thrown in to partly cover the body. The body lay on its right side, with the arms a flexed and the head at the south-western end and the feet at the north-east. The bowl had been placed close to the skull in the south-eastern corner. According to Raftery, the hands had been placed at either side of the vessel. A radiocarbon determination from a collagen sample produced a date of 3755±35 BP,which calibrates to 2287-2038 BC at 95% probability. Brindley (2007, 246-7) places this vessel in stage 2 of the development of the bowl tradition, and suggests that this took place over a period of 100 years centred on 2030 BC (i.e. 2080-1980 BC)'.

Date of upload: 13 August 2012

References

Cahill, M. and Sikora, M. (eds) 2011 Breaking ground, finding graves - reports on the excavations of burials by the National Museum of Ireland, 1927-2006, 2 vols. Dublin. Wordwell Ltd. in association with the National Museum of Ireland.