County: Kildare Site name: NAAS: Main Street North (Black Castle)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: KD019-030013 Licence number: E000179
Author: Kieran Campbell
Site type: Historic town
Period/Dating: Late Medieval (AD 1100-AD 1599)
ITM: E 689260m, N 719530m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.218675, -6.663448
Excavations took place over a three-week period in May-June 1979 at No.s 14, 15 and 16 Main Street North, Naas (Td. Naas West), in advance of a commercial development. The site had an area of 1400sq.m and lay adjacent to the North Motte. Over most of this area natural gravel had been exposed by previous site clearance and archaeological deposits survived only at the northern margin of the site. At the rear of No. 14, 16m from the street frontage, a rectangular stone-lined cess pit, 1.1m by 0.9m and 1.9m deep, was found adjacent to an unmortared wall foundation, 2.5m long and 0.9m wide. A bucket-shaped pit, 1.7m diam. and 1m deep, stone- and mortar-lined, was found at the north-west boundary. Both pits are of 13th-or early 14th-century date. Medieval pottery sherds (total 132) included Dublin-type ware, Dublin-type coarseware, Dublin-type cooking ware and Leinster cooking ware. The ring from a medieval ring-brooch and three sherds of early 16th-century Beauvais medallion jugs (both green- and yellow-glazed) were found in disturbed contexts.
6 St Ultan's, Laytown, Drogheda, Co. Louth
