County: Louth Site name: DUNLEER: Main Street Upper
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR 18:64(08) Licence number: 03E1650
Author: Kieran Campbell
Site type: No archaeology found
Period/Dating: N/A
ITM: E 705558m, N 787981m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.830597, -6.396431
Monitoring took place on 15-16 October 2003 of groundworks associated with the construction of an extension to a house on the east side of Upper Main Street, Dunleer. The end-of-terrace single-storey house, of five bays and of vernacular appearance, is situated 40m to the north of Dunleer motte. The motte is in a field between Upper Main Street on the west and the White River on the east. The area between the motte and the house is largely overgrown with blackthorn bushes. There is a drop in level of 1.6m from the motte field down onto the yard surface of the house, with subsoil exposed at the base of the scarp for a height 0.8m above the concrete yard surface. This suggests that the natural slope had been cut into at some time in the past in order to level the ground, either when the house was first constructed or during the concreting of the yard.
The removal of the concrete slab and its foundation of gravel from the 7m by 6.8m area of the extension exposed natural subsoil, a light yellowish-brown sticky clay, directly below. Nothing of archaeological interest was noted.
6 St Ultan's, Laytown, Drogheda
