County: Westmeath Site name: KILPATRICK (td. Corbetstown)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: D. L. Swan, Dept of History, St. Patrick’s College of Education, Dublin.
Site type: Ecclesiastical Enclosure
Period/Dating: Medieval (AD 400-AD 1600)
ITM: E 657640m, N 755222m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.543767, -7.130321
This site was first noted in the course of an aerial survey of enclosed ecclesiastical sites in the Meath-Westmeath area.
Surrounding an isolated churchyard, and incorporating part of its enclosing wall, there appeared to be indications of a large enclosure ditch and bank. Excavations were undertaken to confirm the existence of these features.
A well defined ditch was revealed, dug into the bedrock to a depth of about 3m under present ground level. The ditch was consistently between 5m and 6m wide at the top, was ‘U’ shaped in profile, and splayed widely close to the surface.
In the south cutting the remains of a partly destroyed inner bank were revealed, and evidence for its having had a facing of large stones also emerged. The fill of the ditch in the excavated sectors was, for the most part, undifferentiated, and largely without stratification. Large quantities of animal bone were recovered from every level, together with a single sherd of glazed, 13th/14th C. pottery, at a depth of 1.4m. The enclosure, as shown by excavation so far, thus comprised a deep fosse with an internal bank, probably stone-faced, defining an oval area, which had a north-south axis estimated at 95m in length, and an east-west axis measuring 80m. At least four phases of activity can be distinguished apart from that associated with the cemetery, all indicative of normal, secular occupation, but it is difficult on present evidence to relate all of these to each other, or to establish a complete chronology.
What seemed to be the earliest phase was represented by a series of features best interpreted as the surviving remnants of almost totally obliterated foundation trenches, having a shallow ‘U’ shaped section, with lines of stakeholes and postholes. Associated with these were a number of hearths and pits, the latter yielding an amount of slag, charcoal, and other evidence of industrial activity.
Elsewhere, from an area of apparently destroyed structure, five further fragments of medieval pottery were recovered, as well as a single sherd of French ware of the same period.
Apart from this, the only other material recovered in significant quantities was animal bone, representing horse, cattle, sheep, pig, with some smaller domestic and wild animals.
