County: Meath Site name: KNOWTH
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: Dr George Eogan, U.C.D.
Site type: Megalithic tomb - passage tomb
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 699842m, N 773821m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.704527, -6.487805
Work continued on the eastern side of Site I (the large mound) and has fully revealed some additional elaborately decorated kerbstones of Site I, around the entrance to the cruciform tomb. Slightly to the east a largely destroyed satellite tomb of cruciform plan was investigated. Most of the work was concentrated on the eastern side of the summit of Site I. Here an early Christian settlement area, 25m x 10m, which had been enclosed by dry stone walls and had possibly been roofed over, was uncovered and partially excavated. Notable features of this phase include 4 souterrains—1 being very elaborate—and evidence for a burning of the settlement followed by re-occupation on a rather impoverished scale. Finds were numerous and most find parallels among the general ringfort/crannog assemblages. They included (a) two bronzes resembling provincial Roman ear scoops, indicating a possible initial date for the settlement in the mid-1st Millennium and (b) two Anglo-Saxon coins of the mid-10th century, found in the fill of the large souterrain. Glazed pottery and some iron nails from a rubble layer above the Early Christian deposits indicate some medieval activity on the site.
Click on the link below for the Royal Irish Academy's online resource for Knowth Excavations:
