County: Cork Site name: Darkwood
Sites and Monuments Record No.: - Licence number: 06E0351
Author: Margaret McCarthy, Archaeological Consultant, Rostellan, Midleton, Co. Cork.
Site type: No archaeological significance.
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 522234m, N 553372m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 51.727311, -9.125711
A test excavation was requested following an application for planning permission to construct a single dwelling house within the constraint zone of a bleach mill (CO107–020) at Darkwood, Dunmanway. The bleach mill is located 32m to the west of the new house site on the northern side of a shallow tributary of the Dirty River. The surviving structure is a two-storey rectangular mill overgrown with ivy. Three test-trenches were excavated, two along the footprint of the house and a third at the percolation area. The topsoil consisted of loose black organic soil typically encountered in vegetable gardens and it varied in depth from 0.35 to 0.5m. The underlying subsoil was examined for in situ archaeological features and nothing of significance was present.
