County: Galway Site name: BALLYDAVID SOUTH
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: Etienne Rynne, Department of Archaeology, University College Galway
Site type: Mound
Period/Dating: Late Medieval (AD 1100-AD 1599)
ITM: E 550261m, N 728528m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.304704, -8.746251
A small mound, about 7.5m N-S by 6.5m E-W and 1.3m in maximum height, sited on the highest part of the esker ridge running E-W directly N of Athenry was threatened by gravel quarrying. Excavation revealed that the mound consisted basically of a cairn-like core covered with earth and stones and contained within a low, rough kerb forming three sides of a square, open on the NE side. The earthen covering contained many broken animal bones and some oyster-shells (settlement debris?), and in it and in the cairn-like core many iron fragments (including block-headed nails), some sheet-bronze fragments and some glass fragments were found. A very small bronze (?)shoe buckle with an iron tongue was found on the old ground level under the edge of the core. In the stone core itself portion of a dot-and-circle decorated bone plaque (part of a single edged comb?) was recovered. A late medieval date at present seems most likely for this enigmatic structure.
