County: Limerick Site name: NEWTOWN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 01E0406
Author: Michael Connolly, Ægis Archaeology Ltd.
Site type: Fulacht fia
Period/Dating: Undetermined
ITM: E 562958m, N 656043m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.654321, -8.547468
A levelled fulacht fiadh was identified during monitoring of topsoil-stripping prior to the construction of the Southern Limerick Ring-Road. The site was originally noted as a spread of burnt soil, shattered stone and charcoal, c. 20m in diameter, in the centre of the road-take.
A 5m-wide trench was excavated for a distance of 17m across the exposed spread from east to west. This clearly showed that the mound material was widely dispersed and shallow at the east, perhaps indicating that the mound had been levelled in this direction.
Excavation showed that the burnt spread represented the remains of a crescentic mound of burnt material surrounding a natural depression, which appears to have been used as the trough.
A shallow, circular area of fire-reddened subsoil, 2.5m in diameter, was excavated 3.6m south-west of the main burnt spread. An arrangement of four post-holes was excavated around the fire-reddened spread, and an argument could be made concerning their possible function as the supports for a cooking-spit over the fire. No artefacts were recovered from the site.
16 Avondale Court, Corbally, Limerick
