County: Dublin Site name: Churchview Road, Killiney
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 19E0324
Author: Steve Hickey, Courtney Deery Heritage Consultancy
Site type: Pit
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 724370m, N 725550m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.265695, -6.135634
Testing was carried out from 10-12 June 2019. A total of ten trenches of varying length (20m-65m) were opened across the site by mechanical digger; the combined linear distance was 382m. All trenches were excavated to natural subsoils. Whilst modern drainage and landscaping features appeared in almost all of the trenches, only T6 revealed a possible archaeological feature, [C5] an anomalous 1.5m x 1.3m shallow pit containing heat-affected stones. A stray metal object (Find #1) consisting of the upper section of a pair of tongs, a possible forging tool, was found within subsoil [C3] c.40m to the north-east in T2 in the same field.
Testing revealed that there was potential, albeit low, to reveal further below-ground archaeological features and, given the size of the site, it was recommended that monitoring of earth-moving works across the site be undertaken.
It was also recommended that the 82m granite stone wall which forms part of the townland boundary is recorded by photographic survey and written description and where possible, this boundary is incorporated into the project design and made a feature of within the development. The design currently proposes to retain much of the tree line as a landscaping feature, two 2.8m breaches will be made in the boundary wall to enable pedestrian access between the northern and southern halves of the site. The recommended location of these two planned breaches follows the identification of existing damaged areas repaired with metal bracing along the boundary wall. Testing at an existing breach in the wall revealed no evidence of a ditch or fosse along the historic townland boundary.
CDHC, Lynwood House, Balinteer Road, Dublin 16
