County: Cork Site name: MUCKRIDGE (2)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 01E0430
Author: Daniel Noonan for Archaeological Consultancy Services Ltd.
Site type: Fulacht fia
Period/Dating: Chalcolithic (2500 BC-2201 BC)
ITM: E 608399m, N 579911m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 51.971201, -7.877761
This site was uncovered in the townland of Muckridge during advanced strip-trenching. The test-strip revealed a large spread of burnt mound material within an area measuring 23m east–west by 16m. The site had been heavily truncated by a number of post-medieval ditches and modern field drains. Two main spreads of material, consisting of heat-fractured sandstone, unburned or partially burnt stone, with frequent charcoal inclusions and several smaller spreads of apparently redeposited burnt material, were excavated.
Removal of these spreads revealed the presence of two large troughs and five smaller possible troughs. A large number of generally randomly situated stake-holes were found, mainly in association with the larger Troughs 1 and 2. A curving line of stake-holes may have been a windbreak for Trough 1. Trough 1 was a rectangular cut into natural subsoil measuring 2.08m north–south by 3.32m and had a maximum depth of 1.02m; it contained timbers in the backfill that may have been lining. Trough 2 was a bowl-shaped cut into natural subsoil, 2.7m north–south by 2.86m and 0.7m deep.
Five smaller pits were uncovered beneath the stony spreads and could also be interpreted as possible troughs and stone storage pits. A carbon sample from the fill of one of these pits, C78, a roughly circular cut measuring 1.44m north–south by 1.25m and 0.6m deep, produced a 2-sigma calibration date of cal. BC 2620–2280 (cal. BP 4570–4230).
This site was one of three fulachta fiadh that were excavated as part of this scheme. These sites, along with the discovery of a possible Bronze Age unenclosed settlement at Ballyvergan West (see Excavations 2001, No. 119), combined with a brief analysis of the information contained in the archaeological inventories for the area surrounding the transect of land for the scheme, indicate a developed Bronze Age landscape in the Youghal area.
Unit 21, Boyne Business Park, Greenhills, Drogheda, Co. Louth
