County: Wicklow Site name: RATHMORE (Monitoring Sites 21 and 23, Killoughter)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 02E0884
Author: Ciara MacManus, ADS Ltd.
Site type: Fulacht fia
Period/Dating: Undetermined
ITM: E 727929m, N 699077m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.027067, -6.092880
The site is in Rathmore townland, on the route of the N11 Newtownmountkennedy–Ballynabarny Road Scheme. It was discovered during monitoring of topsoil clearance to facilitate the construction of the Killoughter interchange.
Excavation revealed a spread of burnt-mound material at the base of the west-facing slope of a hill, on which Monitoring Site 22 was discovered, and 16m east of a small stream that ran through the fulacht fiadh complex excavated in Rathmore by Catherine McLoughlin in 2001 (Excavations 2001, No. 1380, 01E0471).
The fulacht fiadh survived as a ploughed-out burnt spread that measured c. 7.18m north–south by 6.82m, with a maximum depth of 0.28m. This fill overlay a slight hollow, to the north of the site, which may have been used as a trough.
Monitoring Site 23, which was c. 30m south-east of the fulacht, proved to be of no archaeological significance.
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