County: Westmeath Site name: MULLINGAR: Dominick Place
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 96E096 and 96E235
Author: Rosanne Meenan
Site type: Excavation - miscellaneous
Period/Dating: Modern (AD 1750-AD 2000)
ITM: E 643441m, N 752922m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.524470, -7.344855
An assessment was required by Westmeath County Council before the construction of six townhouses in two phases. The development is situated on the site of the Dominican priory in Mullingar, which was occupied by the town gaol after the Dissolution.
Test-trenches on the Phase 1 area (i.e. four houses at the east end of the development) produced evidence for a buildup of garden clay. This was approx. 1m deep; it contained animal bone, brick chips, eighteenth/nineteenth-century pottery and charcoal flecks. A hard yellow natural clay was exposed underneath this.
Test-trenches at the west end of the development exposed an east-west ditch or pit at 600–700mm below the present ground level. This was 3.2m wide at the top and was bottomed at 1.5m below the present ground level. The fill comprised a soft grey redeposited boulder clay with a hard-packed pear-like layer, 100mm deep, at the base. There were no finds in the fill.
During monitoring of foundation trenching, a dumped squared oak timber was found at the base of the feature.
Roestown, Drumree, Co. Meath
