County: Derry Site name: WHITE MOUNTAIN SPRINGS, Tamniaran
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: AE/00/34
Author: Maybelline Gormley, NAC
Site type: Mill - unclassified and Field boundary
Period/Dating: Modern (AD 1750-AD 2000)
ITM: E 671436m, N 906489m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.901053, -6.886218
The NI Water Service required archaeological monitoring of the insertion of a new water main at White Mountain Springs, in the townland of Tamniarin, outside Dungiven, Co. Derry, between May and July 2000. Several archaeological sites lie in the immediate vicinity of the disturbed area, including three Early Christian sites, SMR 31:6, 31:7 and 31:8; a souterrain, SMR 31:5; and two cairns, SMR 31:10 and 31.8—integrated into the later cashel wall.
No prehistoric or Early Christian archaeology was uncovered. The remnants of a millrace going down to a forgotten mill (transformed into a dwelling, now disused) were revealed. Two unrecorded pre-1832 field boundaries and a possible third were also revealed. Conversation with the landowner and desktop research also elucidated the probable location of the ‘Thoan Bann’ fort. This was first recorded by Thomas Fagan for the OS Memoirs in 1834 but had been destroyed systematically between 1816 and 1829. The location was not recorded in the NI Sites and Monuments Record but was believed to possibly be that of the rath SMR 31:6. Research can now site its probable location to be just under 1km to the south-south-west of this site, on an unmarked location, and it may have been prehistoric (possibly a portal tomb?) by its description, although this is itself muddled.
Unit 6, Farset Enterprise Park, 638 Springfield Road, Belfast
