2001:949 - CLARISTOWN 4, Claristown, Meath

The site was exposed at chainage 13185 during archaeological monitoring of a drainage channel conducted by Markus Casey, ACS, under licence number 01E0090 during groundworks associated with the construction of Contract 7 of the Northern Motorway Project.

A single pit was exposed at the base of a drainage channel excavated along the south-western edge of the proposed motorway. It was oval, measuring 0.76m in length, 0.52m in width and up to 0.23m in depth, and had been partially truncated by the ditching bucket during the excavation of the channel. Its sides gradually sloped to a concave rounded base and it had been filled with a grey–black silty clay, 0.05m thick, containing frequent inclusions of charcoal and occasional small stones and oxidised clay, below a secondary fill which consisted of a compact grey clay, 0.18m thick, containing moderate inclusions of small stones.

No further archaeological features or deposits were exposed and no finds were recovered. A radiocarbon date of 2590 ± 70 BP (cal. BC 850–520) was recovered from the fill F005, which places the pit in the late Bronze Age/early Iron Age. It is likely that the pit is associated with a potential site at the very edge of the proposed motorway in the adjacent field to the south-west.