County: Offaly Site name: MAIN STREET, FERBANE
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 04E1608
Author: Rosanne Meenan, Roestown, Drumree, Co. Meath.
Site type: No archaeological significance
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 611148m, N 724628m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.271876, -7.832864
The owner of this site on Main Street received planning permission to demolish outhouses at the back of his premises and to construct townhouses with car parking on the site of the sheds. The planning permission required an assessment, and an inspection of the buildings to be demolished.
Medieval material was not observed in any of the outhouses. Two worked stones are plainly visible in the south-east corner of one of the outhouses; these are late 18th/early 19th-century in date. They were clearly taken from an earlier building that was to be reused and will be retained after demolition.
Eight trenches tested the site prior to development. In Trench 1, a cobbled yard surface was exposed. In Trenches 2-8 sod and garden soil overlay fine yellow/brown fine clay containing occasional flecks of charcoal. Hard-packed grey sandy clay underlay the yellow/brown clay.
There was evidence for the demolished sheds along the inside of the property wall in the deposits of rubble and concrete floors.
