County: Antrim Site name: HOLESTONE (1)
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: AE/06/38
Author: Norman Crothers, for ADS Ltd.
Site type: Ringfort - rath and Kiln - corn
Period/Dating: Early Medieval (AD 400-AD 1099)
ITM: E 724033m, N 888763m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.731605, -6.074170
Test-trenching was carried out beside a site which had been reported to the Agricultural Liaison Officer for the area by the landowner as a now closed-up, but previously accessible, souterrain. The test-trenching revealed several features which may have been associated with the nearby souterrain, and further excavation of the general area uncovered the remains of a ploughed-out rath and a corn-drying kiln.
The remains of the rath consisted of an enclosing ditch with several internal pits and ditches and part of a stone-faced house platform. Approximately a quarter of the rath ditch was exposed within the excavated area. The ditch was 1.1–2m wide and 0.6–0.93m deep. It generally had a U-shaped profile but with occasional stepped portions. The variation in width, depth and profile of the ditch is due to the extremely soft, sandy nature of the subsoil and the effects of differential ploughing. The outer edge of the ditch had been cut through a circular pit, which produced sherds of prehistoric pottery and an end scraper. On the inside of the main rath ditch and roughly concentric with it was a portion of a second ditch with a clearly defined terminal at its east end. The exposed portion of ditch measured 14.5 long by 1.5m wide by 0.45m deep and curved from north through south-east to east. A stone-faced clay platform was uncovered in the north-east limit of the excavation. This probably represents the south-west corner of a subrectangular house and in all likelihood access to the now inaccessible souterrain would have been from the rear of this house (a similar arrangement was found nearby at an extensive Early Christian settlement site at Ballywee).
The corn-drying kiln was discovered 2.5m outside the south side of the rath ditch. It had a semicircular fire pit at its west (downslope) end, with a 3m-long flue running uphill to the drying chamber. The fire pit measured 1.8m north-west/south-east by 1.2m and the drying chamber 1.2m north-west/south-east by 1m. Sherds of souterrain ware were found in the interior of the rath and in the fill of the fire pit of the corn-drying kiln.
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