County: Donegal Site name: MAGHERACAR (Area 3)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 03E1013
Author: Billy Quinn, Moore Archaeological & Environmental Services Ltd. for Irish Archaeological Consultancy Services
Site type: Linear earthwork
Period/Dating: Iron Age (800 BC-AD 339)
ITM: E 482420m, N 582199m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.470326, -8.292398
Testing was carried out at Test Area 3, Magheracar, Bundoran, Co. Donegal, between 8 and 11 July 2003. The work was undertaken for Donegal County Council on behalf of the National Roads Authority. The scheme involves the construction of the proposed N15 Bundoran/Ballyshannon Bypass as part of the National Roads Authority’s programme for upgrading the N15 Sligo to Lifford Road.
Survey work had identified a substantial linear earthwork, possibly of Iron Age date. The site survives in five sections extending over 355m. The earthwork is orientated from east to west and curves to the south-south-west at its western end, where it is cut by the present R280 to Kinlough. At its eastern end it terminates immediately to the north of Sruhanafalla. The earthwork is of dump construction and there is no visible trace of a ditch.
The assessment of the proposed site involved the mechanical excavation of nineteen trenches. Testing confirmed the presence of an associated ditch running alongside the linear bank. The ditch was found variously to the south (Trenches 7, 11 and 12) and to the north (Trench 16) of the earthwork and, in terms of preservation, dimension and fill type, differed along its length. No datable artefacts were retrieved from either the bank material or the ditch.
Plot 29 produced no evidence for an associated ditch in either Trenches 2 or 4. In Plot 29b, between Sections 14e and 14b, Trench 5 exposed only natural boulder clay and bedrock. Trench 7 provided the best-preserved evidence for a ditch to the south, with nothing evident north of the bank. The ditch at this point measured 5m wide; further to the east, in Plot 33, this southern ditch was again exposed in Trenches 11 and 12, surviving to a maximum width of c. 4m. In Plot 34a, Trench 16 exposed a V-shaped ditch to the north; this northern ditch was not found in Trench 18, possibly because it narrows at this point. Based on these results the ditch mostly evident to the south would seem to decrease in width from Plot 29b eastward to Plot 33, a distance of approximately 70m. Whether or not it continues running to the south in Plot 34a could not be determined. The smaller ditch to the north may continue eastwards in Plot 34a, but results from Trench 18 were inconclusive.
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