County: Kerry Site name: LIXNAW: Ballinageragh
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 03E0222
Author: Laurence Dunne, Eachtra Archaeological Projects
Site type: Cremation pit and Structure
Period/Dating: Prehistoric (12700 BC-AD 400)
ITM: E 490210m, N 628934m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.400907, -9.613413
Test-trenches were excavated at the site in advance of the construction of 61 houses. The site is located in the townland of Ballinageragh on the southern limits of Lixnaw village in the centre of the north Kerry plain. A total of 21 trenches were excavated on the site. Three of these contained archaeological features which were subsequently excavated.
Two areas of archaeology were recorded in Trench 2. The western area contained a scatter of post-holes, pits and stake-holes. One pit/post-hole contained a small amount of burnt bone. It is unknown at present if the bone is human or animal and it is possible that the feature is a cremation pit. A sandstone tool with extensive wear patterning on both ends consistent with intensive and regular rubbing was recovered from a large rectangular pit.
At the eastern end of Trench 2 a group of seven pits was recorded. The pits were generally circular in plan and shallow. They each contained a sandy silt fill with charcoal and heat-shattered sandstone. Plant remains were recovered from five of the pits, including wheat grains and hazelnut shells. The cutting-blade of a greenstone axe and the butt end of a shale polished stone axe were also recovered from the pits. A body sherd of possible Neolithic pottery was also recorded in the fill of a possible stake-hole. Two parallel slot-trenches orientated northeast/ south-west were recorded in the area of the pits. The nature of the slot-trenches is not known and, although they are parallel to one another, they cannot be assigned with any confidence as the remains of a Neolithic house or other structure.
A shallow subcircular pit measuring c.1m in diameter and containing a single fill was recorded in Trench 18. The base of the pit was scorched. A small pit was recorded in Trench 20. It contained a large amount of charcoal and burnt clay and the base and the western side of the pit were burnt. A small sample of slag was recovered from the fill and analysis of this is pending. The pit is possibly the remains of a vertical shaft furnace.
Post-excavation work is under way; however, the preliminary results establish for the first time clear settlement evidence for the Neolithic period and Bronze Age in this area of North Kerry.
3 Canal Place, Tralee
