County: Meath Site name: KILMESSAN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 04E1352 EXT.
Author: Aisling Collins and David J. O’Connor, CRDS Ltd.
Site type: Structure
Period/Dating: Medieval (AD 400-AD 1600)
ITM: E 689425m, N 758266m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.566667, -6.650000
At the request of Drumloe Properties Ltd, a programme of excavation was undertaken for the proposed housing development site at the village of Kilmessan. The site was excavated between 12 April and 6 June 2005.
A number of prehistoric finds were recovered from the site, but no features could be positively identified as prehistoric. A period of intense activity occurred during the medieval period (possibly as early as the late 12th century), which saw the site being divided into a series of narrow crofts and tofts. The front (roadside or toft area) of these plots lay beyond the limits of the site. The area affected by the scope of the development would have contained the backyards of these plots. The settlements appear to have gone out of use after a relatively short period of time (c. 100 years?), at which point the area appears to have been abandoned until the 17th century. During the medieval period at least two structures were constructed within these plots: one was of stone construction (which has been preserved in situ) and the other was formed by three stone footings and was a possible ‘cruck’-built structure. A number of pits and ditches were found in association with these structures. In the westernmost area of the site a number of large shallow pits were found near each other, the two deepest of which were found with associated post-holes.
During the post-medieval period the site came into use once more, as at least two structures were built on the eastern end of the site. These structures post-dated one another; the former was associated with a cobbled courtyard and was built along a similar alignment to the earlier medieval buildings, while the latter, which survived as no more than a shallow mortar-filled foundation trench, was built on a different alignment.
Local lore tells of a church that fell out of use or was demolished when the new Roman Catholic church was constructed in 1820 (reconstructed in the 1890s). Extensive historical and cartographic research failed to corroborate this claim, however, and no evidence was uncovered by the excavations to suggest that any of the structures excavated were the remains of this church.
Unit 4, Dundrum Business Park, Dublin 14
