County: Down Site name: NEWCASTLE: Ashleigh Manor, Bryansford Road
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: AE/03/35
Author: Ciara MacManus, Archaeological Development Services Ltd.
Site type: Excavation - miscellaneous
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 736821m, N 831905m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.217747, -5.902042
During the original site visit on 25 March 2003, it was noted that approximately two-thirds of the current phase of this housing development had already been stripped of topsoil, with houses in varying stages of construction in this area. The only area of the current phase of development which remained undisturbed was located on the northern side, where a large area of topsoil stockpile was located, and in a c. 30m-wide strip along the southern boundary of the development. This area was within a hollow at the base of a low drumlin, alongside the main Tollymore to Newcastle road. Monitoring of topsoil-stripping of the southern portion of the development was carried out over a three-day period from 2 to 4 May 2003.
Topsoil-stripping within this area was carried out using a track machine fitted with a toothless bucket. Monitoring revealed that this area had been backfilled with a 1m-deep deposit of modern rubble, which overlay a heavy, sticky, grey boulder clay subsoil. A large spread of what appeared to be burnt-mound material, consisting of a black, sticky, silty clay containing burnt stones, was uncovered approximately 20m from the development boundary within the lowest portion of the site. This spread was 11m long and 6m wide orientated along a north-west/south-east axis.
Excavation of this material revealed it to be very shallow, being no more than 0.12m deep. It also appeared to be mixed with what may have been an old topsoil/ploughsoil horizon which survived as a grey/brown, sticky, loamy clay that produced fragments of post-medieval pottery. Removal of these layers revealed that they overlay natural subsoil with no further evidence for archaeological activity.
The burnt-mound material uncovered may represent the remains of archaeological activity associated with prehistoric cooking activity or fulachta fiadh. The remains uncovered at this site, however, do not appear to be in situ, being very shallow in nature and mixed within a ploughsoil horizon. The overburden material removed from above these layers suggests that there had been a great deal of disturbance in this area in the more recent past, perhaps related to the realignment of the existing Newcastle to Tollymore road, which in turn appears to have destroyed any previous archaeological remains which may have survived.
Unit 48, Westlink Enterprise Centre, 30–50 Distillery Street, Belfast BT12 5BJ
