2002:1652 - KEELTY, Sligo

During the monitoring of excavation works associated with the Castletown Group-Water Scheme, a possible fulacht fiadh was uncovered along the route of a new access road on the south-west-facing slope of King’s Mountain. As the access road could not be moved to avoid the site, it was decided to excavate the part to be directly affected by the proposed road.

The area excavated measured 7m north-east/ south-west (the orientation of access road) by 6.2m. The north-eastern and south-western extents of the fulacht fiadh were fully established, but the archaeological material clearly extended beyond the limit of excavation to the north-west and south-east. The top of the fulacht fiadh was fairly even, sloping to the south-west with the slope of the hill. Although the burnt material of the fulacht was revealed just under the sod on the western side of the access road, toward the centre and eastern side it was sealed by a substantial deposit of redeposited subsoil, probably the result of dumping when the drain adjacent to the access road was cleaned out in the recent past.

A possible trough was revealed on the eastern side of the area excavated, extending eastern beyond the limit of the excavation. It was oriented north-east/ south-west and was irregular in shape, measuring 1.5m by 0.52–0.92m. It was sharply cut to the north and north-east, with more irregular edges on the western and south-western sides. It was 0.3–0.4m deep and was filled with the same mixed burnt stone and charcoal-enriched soil that comprised the main body of the fulacht fiadh. This was a mixed deposit of burnt cracked stone, most of which was sandstone, and charcoal-enriched clay/soil. It varied from 0.1m deep at the north-east and south-west ends to 0.45m at its deepest. There were no finds, bones or other features within this deposit.

Cloonfad Cottage, Cloonfad, Carrick-on-Shannon, Co. Leitrim