County: Galway Site name: CASTLEGAR
Sites and Monuments Record No.: GA103-103 Licence number: 03E556
Author: Richard Crumlish
Site type: No archaeology found
Period/Dating: N/A
ITM: E 543798m, N 718679m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.215550, -8.841477
Pre-development testing was carried out at the site of a proposed dwelling-house and septic tank at Castlegar townland, Co. Galway, on 25 April 2003. The proposed development was located partly within the constraint for a castle site (SMR 103:103). The site was situated in a gently undulating pasture field enclosed by drystone walls. According to the landowner, this field was reclaimed in the 1960s with a bulldozer.
Testing consisted of the excavation (by machine) of five trenches, which measured 19m, 30m, 12.35m, 6.8m and 30.2 long respectively, 0.85–1.2m wide and 0–0.8m deep. The stratigraphy consisted of topsoil, above grey friable sandy silt loam, orange/brown firm silt loam, backfilled rocks and bedrock, which outcropped in places.
The topsoil contained mostly modern artefacts; however, three sherds of post-medieval pottery were recovered. No artefacts were recovered from three of the trenches. The grey, friable, sandy silt loam and the orange/brown firm silt loam were sterile natural subsoil. The evidence from four of the trenches was of undisturbed natural stratigraphy. One trench, however, showed evidence, in the form of the backfilled rocks, that this field had been, as the landowner states, reclaimed.
61 An Cladrach, Castlebar Road, Ballinrobe, Co. Mayo
