County: Offaly Site name: RATHDRUM
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 05E0553
Author: Sinclair Turrell, ADS Ltd.
Site type: Road - class 1 togher
Period/Dating: Late Medieval (AD 1100-AD 1599)
ITM: E 642783m, N 728379m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.303977, -7.358107
This site was identified by the IAWU as a primary togher in July 2001, running for 620m in a north-east/south-west orientation (OF-RDM0004). Two dendro dates were obtained from timbers taken from the primary sighting. A timber from the basal layer returned a date of AD 1230±9 or later, yet a timber from an upper layer was dated to AD 1159±9 or later. Five cuttings were excavated along the length of this trackway and an additional 25 sightings recorded.
This was a complex and variable trackway, running across the narrowest part of the bog, connecting dry land on either side. A feature of the trackway was its increasing thickness and complexity towards the north-eastern end. In Cutting 2 there were at least three successive layers of brushwood, partly overlain by a patch of stones and marl, which was overlain in turn by a further brushwood layer. The stony marl did not seem to be continuous along the trackway but rather to have been laid down in patches, perhaps in an attempt to fill in damp areas. The marl itself was identical to that found as subsoil to the east of the bog, from where it had probably been obtained. One persistent feature, apart from the marl, was a closely set, double row of short pegs, with wedge-shaped worked ends angled in towards each other, these being present at both ends of the trackway. In Cutting 5, to the south-west, there was a further double row of short upright pegs outside the double row, as well as a central row of slender brushwood pegs. There was marl in this cutting but no brushwood layers. Scrap wood, in the form of plank fragments and perhaps hurdles, was encountered in several cuttings and seemed to have also been used in the construction of the trackway. This wood, almost certainly reused, probably accounts for the anomalous dendro dates previously obtained.
It is not certain at present whether the successive layers of brushwood found in the north-eastern cuttings represent different trackways or merely later repairs and renewal of the same trackway. These dense brushwood layers are not present to the south-west, which may suggest that it is in fact a single trackway and that wetter conditions to the north-east may have necessitated several phases of renewal here. This is a question which cannot be resolved by archaeology alone and which the results of the environmental programme may be able to clarify.
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