2002:0680 - SKIDOO, Dublin

Excavation was undertaken in Skidoo, north County Dublin, before development works. The site was uncovered during the monitoring of topsoil removal (No. 679, Excavations 2002, 02E0285). Two features were excavated: Feature 1 was a shallow pit containing Bronze Age pottery; and Feature 2 was a linear feature also containing some pottery and burnt bone.
Feature 1 was a shallow depression, or possible base of a heavily truncated pit, containing sherds of thick (>0.01m), coarse pottery, which has been provisionally identified as Bronze Age. This possible pit was subcircular, measuring 0.27m east–west by 0.24m.

Feature 2, c. 3m south of Feature 1, comprised a linear cut (aligned east–west, measuring 18m by 1.36m) containing three phases of fill. The latest phase of deposition, 10m long and 0.9m wide, comprised a firm, mid-brown, silty clay. This contained blackened prehistoric pottery, occasional animal bone and some fragments of burnt bone. The next phase of fills comprised several charred layers directly underneath the eastern part of the latest fill. It is suggested that these layers are the fragile remains of worked timber that may have formed a structure either incorporating the linear cut or at an unknown location elsewhere. The third phase of fills comprised several similar fills of a red/brown silty clay. No charcoal or artefacts have been recovered from these fills.

The surface of both features showed recent mechanical plough scars. The extent of the area investigated around the features was determined by the development. It is not known whether further archaeological material is present in the vicinity; however, no other features are at risk from the development.

70 The Square, Riverbank, Drogheda, Co. Louth