County: Kilkenny Site name: BALLYVOOL, CO. KILKENNY
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR KK032-052 Licence number: E1095
Author: ELLEN PRENDERGAST
Site type: Early Bronze Age graves
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 660718m, N 634329m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.457038, -7.106605
Introduction
In June 1946 during tillage operations a short cist containing a collared urn and cremation was discovered near Inistioge, Co. Kilkenny. The covering slab of the pit appears to have been flush with the ground level at the time of discovery. The workmen removed all of the cist stones except for the basal slab, and in doing so partly broke the urn. Fortunately, the vessel had not been lifted off the bones and was secured in place by being tied with cord. The site was reported to An Garda Síochána, who informed the NMI. It was investigated over one day by Ellen Prendergast. This report is based on Prendergast’s drawings and account of the site. The human remains were examined by Professor E.J. Keenan.
Location (Fig. 3.90)
The site was in the townland of Ballyvool, east Co. Kilkenny.149 It was in a tillage field between 213m and 244m above sea level. No sites of similar date are known from the vicinity.
Description of site
The grave had been completely dismantled by the workmen but they helped to reconstruct it as they remembered it.150 The cist was polygonal in outline, measuring 0.59m long at the longest side by 0.51m wide by 0.46m deep internally (Fig. 3.91).151 It was composed of a double row of shale slabs set on edge and inclining inwards towards the top. These inclined
inwards to a width of 0.26m beneath the capstone and were flanked externally at their base by a series of smaller packing stones to a height of c. 0.16m. The cist was paved with a single polygonal slab, 0.5m wide by 0.58m long by 0.08m thick. This rested on firm, undisturbed yellow clay. The capstone, which was at ground level, was irregular in shape, measuring 0.91m long by 0.79m wide by 0.26m thick. It did not rest directly on the side stones but on a number of smaller stones placed on the side stones. The grave contained a collared urn that had been inverted over a deposit of cremated bone (1946:340).152 The urn had been placed at the centre of the cist. The human remains were found to represent the remains of ‘at least one adult’.
Collared urn, 1946:339153 (Fig. 3.92)
The urn is classed as a collared urn by Brindley (2007, 135), although the NMI register classes it as a cordoned urn. This difference of opinion is interesting and draws attention to the close similarities between some collared and cordoned urns and the difficulty in clearly differentiating between some examples. This urn has a concave neck with slightly everted rim. It is divided into three sections by distinct mouldings at the shoulder and on the upper body. The inside of the neck is decorated with slanted scored lines, while the outside is decorated with poorly executed zigzags. There is a similar zigzag motif running between the mouldings. The lower part of the body is decorated with an indiscriminate pattern of scored lines forming triangular and other rectilinear shapes. This vessel is not listed by Kavanagh (1976).
Dimensions: H 36.4cm; ext. D rim 29.4cm; D base 11.3cm
Comment
A sample of the cremation was submitted for AMS dating and yielded a date of 3625±40 BP, which calibrates to 2132–1889 BC.154 Brindley (2007, 283–4) places the urn in stage 1 of the development of the collared urn typology, which is dated to 1850/30–1800 BC, but she also suggests that the Ballyvool urn can be dated to c. 1850–1830 BC. Brindley (2007, 218) describes some stage 3 collared urns as showing ‘characteristics of cordoned urns and are considered to represent a final stage in [their] development’. She points to similarities such as the ‘ridge-or cordon-like appearance of the tripartite divisions of the profile’. These are features of the urn from Ballyvool and also of the urn from Carrigeens, Co. Sligo (this volume,pp 435–49).
It is on the basis of its decoration, however, that the Ballyvool urn is placed in stage 1, as it is seen as closer to the decorative style of vase urns.
HUMAN REMAINS
E.J. KEENAN
There are present the cremated remains of at least one adult human skeleton. The condition of the bones does not permit identification of age, sex or other physical characteristics.
149. Parish of Inistioge, barony of Gowran. SMR KK032-052——. IGR 260781 134281.
150. It should be noted that the plan and section are therefore reconstructions, although the sockets of the stones were visible and thus helped to make this a more accurate reconstruction.
151. The orientation of the cist is not known, as a north arrow was not included on the plan.
152. The report states that the urn was inverted over a cremation but it seems more likely that the cremation was contained within the urnl.
153. This vessel is not listed by Kavanagh (1976).
154. GrA-24178.
