County: Sligo Site name: BALLINPHULL, Cliffoney
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 01E0603
Author: Martin A. Timoney
Site type: No archaeology found
Period/Dating: N/A
ITM: E 570165m, N 853733m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.431272, -8.459804
Monitoring of development works over four acres in two fields under pasture was carried out on various dates from July to December 2001. The nearest monument, SMR 2:14, an early monastic enclosure, is 90m to the west of the western edge of the area.
The space for the road, the parking area, the linking walkway, trenches for water and sewage pipes, landscaping, replacement of a stone culvert, new drainage trenches, and the edges of all the sites, totalling about 4500m2, were all monitored.
The brown, light brown or cream soil in this area is derived from the underlying sandstone. It was generally devoid of stones until at least a depth of 0.8m. Then occasional large sandstone blocks or slabs were encountered. There were no archaeological finds.
The pattern of fields here differed radically from what is shown on the first edition OS map of 1836. On that map four buildings, probably one house and three sheds, are marked in the second field, a good distance down a lane that enters off the main Sligo to Bundoran road. One cannot be absolutely certain but it seems that these buildings were backing onto, as opposed to facing, the side road to Mullaghmore, which is believed to be of early 19th-century date. There were no foundations for these buildings and no dating evidence either. At the rear of the house was found a 0.03m-deep spread of barnach (limpet) shells of different sizes. These are interpreted as being associated with the house and sheds and are probably of 19th- or perhaps late 18th-century date.
Bóthar an Chorainn, Keash, Co. Sligo
