County: Kerry Site name: KILLORGLIN: St James' Church, Bridge Street Lower
Sites and Monuments Record No.: KE056-025 Licence number: 04E1698
Author: Laurence Dunne, Eachtra Archaeological Projects
Site type: Graveyard
Period/Dating: Modern (AD 1750-AD 2000)
ITM: E 479010m, N 596016m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.102802, -9.766133
An assessment was undertaken at St James' Church, Killorglin. Planning permission has been sought for a change of use of the church to a wine bar. The proposed development is within the zone of archaeological potential for a castle and an ogham stone. St James' Church is listed as a protected structure in the Kerry County Council County Development Plan 2003–2009.
Six test-trenches were excavated with a tracked mini-digger. Two trenches, Trenches 4 and 5, were excavated within the church and the remaining four were excavated outside the church along the west, south and east gables. Seven disinterred graves were identified in the course of testing. The remains were reinterred at Kilcolman Church in Milltown. Evidence gathered during testing would support 19th-and 20th-century dates for the graves. Disarticulated human remains from an eighth burial discovered adjacent to the entrance to the church could not be accounted for, although it is probable that they are contemporaneous with the church and are 19th- or 20th- century in date.
A line of five post-holes was recorded in Trench 3. They were parallel to the western boundary wall. Inclusions in the fill were all consistent with a 19thcenutury date. They may represent a boundary fence pre-dating the western wall. Alternatively, they could show the former location of a lean-to shelter for turf or wood used in the stoves within the church. A wall foundation perpendicular to Trench 4 was encountered 5m from the eastern end of the trench. It consisted of two rows of limestone rubble inwardly displaced with smaller stones packed between that were cemented with a lime/sand mortar. Only the basal course survived. The wall had no structural function within the church in either the original section or the extension. It may have functioned as a boundary wall of the first phase of the church. Three gully-traps were recorded on the east, south and west gables.
Ballycurreen Industrial Estate, Kinsale Road, Cork
