County: Westmeath Site name: KILLININNEEN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 05E0937
Author: Bernard Guinan, Coosan, Athlone, Co. Westmeath.
Site type: No archaeological significance
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 631903m, N 745127m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.455246, -7.519653
Pre-development testing was carried out in advance of the construction of a slatted shed within the constraint area of SMR 23:58, Castle (site of), at Killininneen, Drumraney, Co. Westmeath. The development site was located on flat ground at the rear of a farmyard. The farmyard surrounds the now derelict Killininneen House, which stands on the site of a former castle.
Four machine-cut trenches (1.5m wide by 15m long, orientated east–west) were excavated across the site. A feature of the test area was the deep layer of redeposited gravel that made up the ground surface at the western end. This material was brought onto the site to build a slatted shed in the 1990s. This hard compact material ranged from 1.1 to 1.8m in depth and occurred consistently across the site. The layer had modern material interspersed throughout, including silage wrap and animal bone. Beneath the redeposited material the original topsoil was preserved at the western end of each trench. Stratigraphically the eastern end of each trench consisted of a mid-brown topsoil over an orange subsoil and a light-brown boulder clay. Much of the ground across the test area was previously disturbed.
No archaeological finds features or deposits were uncovered during the course of testing.
