2025:443 - Ballycasheen, Kerry

Licensed archaeological testing in the townland of Ballycasheen on the eastern urban limits of Killarney town, Co. Kerry was undertaken in June 2025. A series of 47 test trenches extending for c. 3800m were completed across the site.  All trenches were topsoil stripped using a 13-ton track machine fitted with 1.8m-wide grading bucket.

Two locations of archaeological interest were recorded in trenches T19 and T24 and assigned as Burnt Mound 1 (c.11m x 6m) and Burnt Mound 2 (c.12m x 12m). Both features comprised deposits of heat-shattered stone within a charcoal-rich, dark silty matrix typical of fulacht fiadh (burnt mound). On the basis of probability the burnt mounds are initially interpreted as reflecting Bronze Age activity. Two soil samples were recovered for post-processing and potential dating. A single find, comprising of burnt flint debitage was recovered from Burnt Mound 1 in trench T24.

Additionally, an early modern pit was recorded in the immediate vicinity of Burnt Mound 1 from which a number of 20th/19th-century finds were recovered.

Nothing of archaeological interest was found in any of the other test trenches.