County: Sligo Site name: STRANDHILL
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 99E0318
Author: Eoin Halpin, ADS Ltd.
Site type: No archaeology found
Period/Dating: N/A
ITM: E 560859m, N 836105m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.272253, -8.600907
The test excavations took place on a proposed development to the north of Strandhill, Co. Sligo. The test-trenches were positioned in order to assess the location and complexity of the remains of any archaeological deposits on the site of the proposed development. The area consists of machair grassland and a thin turf line, less than 0.2m thick, lying directly on shell sand. The area is low and undulating, with a number of distinctive deflation hollows along the north-west portion of the site. A long linear depression, c. 10m by 25m, runs diagonally across the site from north-west to south-east, close to the line of the access road from the main road. The vegetation in the hollows and gully suggests that they regularly flood, presumably with the rising and falling seasonal water-table.
The only other pre-assessment features of note in the area were two mounds. The first, in the extreme south-east corner of the development, was rounded and steep-sided and stood c. 2.5m above the otherwise flat ground. The mound appeared to be the western end of a ridge, which extended in an easterly direction away from the site. As all development was to remain at least 10m from the edge of this feature, it was decided not to disturb it during the assessment. The second mound, c. 100m north-west of the first, was a much lower, more spread affair. However, it was clear from the geography of the adjoining field that it was also the western end of a long ridge that extended eastwards.
Nothing of archaeological significance was noted during the assessment. The thin turf cover, in all trenches, directly overlay natural, undisturbed shell sand. The linear striations noted in certain areas of the site indicate small-scale, short-term cultivation. The two mounds, one of which will not be affected by the proposal, are probably the natural remnants of a dune system, which have, over time, been covered in grass and stabilised. Such ancient dunes presumably gave the area its name.
Unit 48, Westlink Enterprise Centre, 30–50 Distillery Street, Belfast BT12 5BJ
