County: Meath Site name: DUNSHAUGHLIN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 99E0114
Author: Rosanne Meenan
Site type: Enclosure
Period/Dating: Undetermined
ITM: E 696930m, N 752722m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.515532, -6.538465
A condition of the planning permission required a site assessment before development.
The development site is on the north side of Dunshaughlin village, c. 100m to the north-east of the church of St Secundinius. According to tradition, the church was founded in the mid-5th century, and there are references to it in sources in the 9th century and later.
Four two-storey dwellings are planned for the site, which is at present under grass. Six trenches tested the area of the proposed development, five of which were perpendicular to the boundary wall on the west side. They were positioned to coincide with the walls of the proposed houses.
Evidence for a ditch was exposed in Trenches 2, 4 and 6, and possibly Trench 3. Its upper layers were characterised by a loose, black or dark grey clay that was distinct from the underlying gritty boulder clay. It appeared to be c. 4m wide. It was at least 1.7m deep, probably deeper, and there were indications in Trench 2 that the lower levels were waterlogged, as evidenced by the survival of a timber plank. At the level where excavation ceased in Trench 2 the ditch appeared to be c. 2m wide at its lower levels.
The ditch in Trench 6 did not appear to lie in the same arc as formed by the ditch in Trenches 2 and 4. This hinted at the possibility of the survival of two ditches, although if that had been the case the two would have been very close to each other. In this case the ditch exposed in Trenches 2 and 4 would be an inner ditch and that exposed in Trench 6 an outer ditch.
It is also possible that the ditch was not originally excavated as a regular circle.
There was no obvious evidence for a bank on the inner side of the edge of the ditch.
Roestown, Drumree, Co. Meath
