County: Dublin Site name: LUSK
Sites and Monuments Record No.: RMP 8:10 Licence number: 01E0872 ext.
Author: Christine Baker, Arch-Tech Ltd.
Site type: Ecclesiastical enclosure and Habitation site
Period/Dating: Medieval (AD 400-AD 1600)
ITM: E 721606m, N 754494m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.526326, -6.165884
The potential development area is located to the south-west of the centre of the village. Eight trenches (Trenches A–H) were opened by machine. Topsoil, a dark brown friable silty clay (average depth 0.42m), overlay either a single layer (that varied between trenches) or was directly over a yellow-grey stony subsoil. A total of 61 features were identified.
The testing programme uncovered three features (F8, F11/F12, F18) that may correspond with the line of the ecclesiastical enclosure. Varying from 4.6m (F8) to 5.85m (F11/F12) in width, these features are of the substantial dimensions consistent with ecclesiastical enclosures. However, sections excavated across F8 and F11/12 showed these ditches to be cut into natural subsoil for a depth of 0.4m and 0.52m (0.98m and 1m from present ground level) respectively. They are steep-sided and flat-bottomed with relatively few fills. Even allowing for the considerable reduction in ground level through extensive agricultural activity, the ditches do not appear to be of a depth substantial enough to constitute a boundary comparable to other ecclesiastical sites (e.g. Armagh). Although of lesser depth, they do appear to form a line of demarcation for the ecclesiastical site.
A bone spindle-whorl and an iron blade of early medieval date and a single sherd of medieval pottery were recovered from stratified layers in defined features, indicating occupation of the site for centuries.
32 Fitzwilliam Place, Dublin 2
