County: Limerick Site name: KILMALLOCK: Sheares Street (rear of)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR 47:22 Licence number: 00E0305 ext.
Author: Meriel McClatchie, Archaeological Services Unit, Department of Archaeology, University College Cork
Site type: Historic town
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 560568m, N 627860m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.400844, -8.579441
The final phase of monitoring associated with a housing development was undertaken at a site to the rear of Sheares Street, Kilmallock, during April and May 2001. The work was carried out in compliance with planning conditions imposed on the development. The site is located to the west of Sheares Street within the walled town of Kilmallock. Sheares Street represents an extension of the medieval town during the post-medieval period. Development at the greenfield site necessitated the excavation of trenches for fifteen house foundations, an access road, service pipes and two retaining walls.
Monitoring and excavation was previously carried out at the site during 2000 (Excavations 2000, No. 587). Topsoil up to 0.2m in depth was removed from the site. A layer of garden soil up to 0.5m deep was located beneath the topsoil in all areas. The garden soil layer was removed where necessary and was found to contain artefacts dating from the medieval period to modern times.
A layer of boulder clay was exposed beneath the garden soil layer. A number of mostly truncated archaeological features were cut into the boulder clay. Features that were to be disturbed by development, including furrows, pits and a field ditch, were excavated. An adult human skeleton was also recovered from a shallow grave cut into the base of the field ditch. Excavated features contained medieval and post-medieval artefacts. It seems likely that most of the archaeological features uncovered at the site were related to agricultural activity.
The licence was extended into 2001 to facilitate the monitoring of two retaining wall trenches to be built when the houses were erected. Each trench measured 1.15m in width and 0.4m in depth and contained only garden soil. A small number of artefacts, including post-medieval and modern pottery sherds, were recovered from this garden soil layer. All soil disturbance associated with this project at the site is now complete.
