2004:1871 - KILCOOLE: Lott Lane, Wicklow

Testing was carried out on 15 September 2004 on the site of a proposed development, an extension to the south of the existing Carriagmor housing estate, along the western side of Lott Lane, Kilcoole, Co. Wicklow. The plans provide for the construction of eight detached houses and a block of townhouses. The assessment took the form of eight cuttings. In each case the topsoil was stripped by a JCB fitted with a 1.6m-wide grading bucket.

Cuttings 1–4 and 6–8 contained no features or artefacts of archaeological significance. Cutting 5 was located at the south-western corner of the site. It measured 14m long by 1.6m wide by up to 0.7m deep. The subsoil was compact brown silty clay containing some small to medium stones. A drain was cut into the subsoil, aligned east-west, c. 2.5m from the southern end of the cutting, which filled up rapidly once exposed, water flowing into it from aboveground to the south. The topsoil at this point was saturated grey mud. The teeth, jawbones and some long bones of a cow were found on the surface of the subsoil, 8–8.5m from the southern end of the cutting. This cluster of faunal material was associated with two sherds of pottery. One of these was a plain body sherd from a creamware dish, the other a base sherd with foot-ring from a pearlware dish with blue transfer-printed decoration. A bramble-covered mortared limestone wall, aligned north-west to south-east, was partially exposed on the western side of the cutting. A roughly 5m-long section of the eastern face of the wall was revealed, with a maximum visible height of c. 0.9m.

The excavation of trial cuttings at this site failed to uncover any features, deposits or artefacts of archaeological significance. The only features of any kind were located in Cutting 5. These were the line of a field drain, following the slope of the ground from the west to Lott Lane to the east, the remains of a buried cow, associated with two 19th-century sherds of pottery, and part of a limestone wall aligned southeast to north-west. It seems certain that this structure is part of a rectangular building shown on the 1910 edition of the OS map. This building appears to be the same one represented on the first-edition OS map of 1838, when it was L-shaped in plan. Therefore, it is quite possible that the surviving masonry, which will be demolished in the course of the development, originated in the 18th century.