County: Clare Site name: LATOON NORTH (Site R1)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 03E0835
Author: Elizabeth Connolly, for Irish Archaeological Consultancy Ltd.
Site type: Riverine revetment
Period/Dating: Undetermined
ITM: E 538124m, N 671764m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.793335, -8.917423
Testing was carried out at site R1 from 23 to 24 June 2003 as part of a programme of site-specific testing along the route of the proposed Ennis Bypass. Site R1 is located at the crossing of Latoon creek in the townland of Latoon North, c. 7km south-east of Ennis. Latoon creek, which flows east–west at this point, is the tidal outflow of the Ardsollus River and is bounded by artificial banks constructed to control the flooding of the surrounding low-lying lands. Testing here was to establish the antiquity of the banks and whether any evidence of archaeology existed within the flood-plain on either side.
Six trenches were mechanically excavated to natural. Nothing of archaeological significance was found. To minimise disturbance only the northern half of the northern bank of the river was excavated. The excavation revealed nothing of its date, but the bank was shown to have been constructed in one activity, being 2m high and composed totally of redeposited orange-brown subsoil overlying blue-grey alluvial clay.
8 Dungar Terrace, Dún Laoghaire, Co. Dublin
