County: Down Site name: MAGHERA (Carnacavill td)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: C.J. Lynn, DoE
Site type: Ecclesiastical enclosure
Period/Dating: Medieval (AD 400-AD 1600)
ITM: E 737121m, N 834104m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.237418, -5.896442
The proposed 1/2 acre extension of the graveyard of the present church lay 15m SW of the ruin of the medieval church and 80m SE of the stump of the round tower. The S boundary of the area consisted of a curving hedge incorporating a row of boulders thought to delimit an early ecclesiastical enclosure.
The entire area was sampled using a series of forty small trenches 1m wide and 1m apart. The 20cm-thick layer of topsoil resulted from prolonged tillage, though there was a dearth of modern finds. There was a broad area containing small pieces of slag or clinker to the S, and other finds included a few sherds of souterrain ware, tuyeres and medieval jug sherds, as well as two socketed iron arrowheads.
Stratified and undisturbed deposits existed in limited areas where three main types of features were discovered. There was a series of shallow gullies, c. 0.15m wide and 0.5m deep, filled with brown loam and generally parallel, running SW-NE. They were irregularly spaced and ranged in length up to 10m , with most of the everted-rim ware corning from them. They did not appear to be structural and the free-draining nature of the subsoil would rule out the need for constructed drains.
Several deep pits and substantial gullies, some containing souterrain ware, occurred at the S end of the site against the boundary hedge/bank. They did not suggest building plans.
A V-sectioned ditch was traced for 25m E-W across the site, 45m inside and roughly parallel to the boundary hedge/bank. It was 4m wide and 2m deep with a homogeneous gravelly fill, in which sherds of souterrain ware were found; there was no trace of an accompanying bank. This would be typical of an early ecclesiastical enclosure.
