County: Sligo Site name: SROOVE (Lough Gara)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR 46:29 Licence number: 97E0209
Author: Christina Fredengren, Department of Archaeology, Stockholm University
Site type: Crannog
Period/Dating: Early Medieval (AD 400-AD 1099)
ITM: E 570946m, N 798852m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.938188, -8.442478
The Crannog Research Programme has been working in Lough Gara since 1995. The work started with a survey and a mapping of areas around the shoreline. The project is interdisciplinary, involving quaternary geologists to investigate the lakebed of Lough Gara. The coring of lake sediments during the summer of 1996 was to give an understanding of former lake-level changes. With the financial support from the Heritage Council a large-scale sampling of wood and animal bones from other island sites around the lake was carried out during summer 1999. The purpose of the sampling is to provide better knowledge of the settlement pattern in the lake over time. The samples have been radiocarbon dated by the isotope laboratories in Gronigen.
Crannog studies are to a large extent based on the findings from larger, royal sites such as Lagore, Ballinderry 1 and 2 and Moynagh Lough. In 1997 The Crannog Research Programme started the excavations in Lough Gara. Instead of focusing on a larger crannog site, the project has been involved in researching the archaeology of the small crannogs. With the excavation as a basis, the project aims at an understanding of the wider region of Lough Gara, incorporating an analysis also of the dryland monuments in Sligo, Roscommon and Mayo, as well as other features in the landscape. An article about the importance of islands in the cognitive and imaginative landscape mainly during the Early Christian period was published in 1998.
Information from previous seasons at this site, on the western shores of Lough Gara, have been published in Excavations 1997 (156), Excavations 1998 (185) and Archaeology Ireland (1998, vol. 12, no. 1). All the radiocarbon dates received to date show that the site belongs to the Early Christian period.
In 1999 the eastern half of the site, the side that is nearest to the water, was excavated. This involved continued work in the south-eastern trench. A new trench in the north-eastern area of the site was also opened. When the site was surveyed this area showed what was interpreted as a small harbour-arm. The stratigraphy largely followed that in the other excavated areas of the site. A layer of boulders lay above a layer of shattered, fire-cracked stones. Under the stone layers a floor/deck of horizontal timbers was exposed.
Among the finds this year were three bone pins and a piece of a lignite bracelet.
In general this small site shows a more modest material culture than the larger, contemporary crannog sites. These excavations should help to initiate discussion on the life on the lake shore of people that did not belong to the upper echelons of society.
The Crannog Research Programme thanks Dúchas The Heritage Service and the National Committee for Archaeology at the Royal Irish Academy for finances and support.
106 91 Stockholm
