2002:0225 - BALTIMORE, Cork

Test-trenching had been carried out at this site in 1998, in the interior of the castle and in the bawn (see Excavations 1998, No. 56, for details and a description of the structure). The present excavation comprised the complete excavation of the castle interior and was carried out in January 2002. The site is a fortified house, which is being fully restored by the owner.

Before the excavation, bedrock was exposed over most of the northern half of the castle interior, and no archaeological deposits survived. In the southern half, however, traces of two hearths were recovered that could only have belonged to structures that pre-dated the castle. The northern hearth was easily identified by the large hearthstone exhibiting extensive heat cracking and the layer of ashes above it. A floor of hard-packed white clay extended northward from the hearth for c. 3m to where a shelf of the bedrock appeared to have been deliberately cut in an east–west line. The north wall of the building was probably built on this bedrock. The southern hearth was identified by a layer of ashes, 0.1–0.15m deep, around it, but it lacked a hearthstone. Below the layer of ashes a depression, 0.3m long, 0.2m wide and 0.1m deep, was framed by a large, flat stone on its west side and a row of small stake-holes along its north side. The setting of stake-holes suggests that the hearth may have had a raised grate mounted on metal legs.

The hearths were separated by an east–west band of stones bonded with a blue/grey clay, which was part of the wall foundations of the structure. The structure therefore appears to have been rectangular, with its long axis oriented north–south. It was divided into at least two rooms, the northern room with a hearth in its south wall and the southern room with a hearth in its east wall. The northern room would have measured 4.3m north–south by c. 3.6m. It is impossible to ascertain the full extent of the structure as much of it has been destroyed by the construction of the castle and later activity.

The two fireplaces cannot have been related to, or contemporary with, the existing castle, which is a two-storey building with its main living areas directly above these hearths. The most plausible explanation is that the hearths belonged to the houses that are shown in this area on an early 17th-century map of Baltimore (Priestly 1984). This map shows a row of houses on the western side of the bawn where the present castle stands and another, earlier castle on the eastern side of the bawn. No trace of this latter castle now survives above ground.

Reference
Priestly, E.J. 1984 An early 17th-century map of Baltimore. Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society 89, 55–7.

Ballynanelagh, Rathcormac, Co. Cork