County: Kilkenny Site name: AR 15, Ballykillaboy
Sites and Monuments Record No.: - Licence number: A032/13, E2502
Author: Graeme Laidlaw, Valerie J. Keeley Ltd, Brehon House, Castlecomer, Co. Kilkenny.
Site type: Metalworking area – medieval?
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 657816m, N 619876m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.327457, -7.151784
The site was located within the proposed N9/N10 Kilkullen to Waterford scheme. The site was located in Ballykillaboy townland in Co. Kilkenny, 5km south of Mullinavat. It is situated on gently sloping pastureland beside a seasonal turlough. The site affords minimal views to the south and east, a few hundred metres to the north and west. Excavation began on 25 July and lasted for a period of six weeks.
Excavation of the site produced evidence of a possible workshop undertaking secondary smithing of both copper and iron. There appears to have been two broad phases of activity, although the exact phasing of many of the features is at this point unclear due to a lack of a stratigraphic relationship. The initial phase of metalworking appears to have been confined to a roughly V-shaped area measuring 15m east–west and between 9m and 3m wide. Four non-continuous ditches and several post-holes defined this area. The main focus of activity within this area occurred in a concentration on the higher ground at the east of the site. It appears to have been accessed from the south by a small north-east/south-west-orientated cobbled path and delineated to the north by two shallow curvilinear gullies that appear to have drained water from the metalworking area. The features within this area consisted of a pit that measured 0.8m by 0.6m by 0.3m and was partly surrounded by an area of oxidised clay, a second stone-lined pit that measured 1m by 0.9m by 0.4m and a hearth. These features were surrounded by large amounts of stake- and post-holes that may have supported large timber bellows or additional metalworking furniture. Successive deposits of material rich in charcoal and metalworking debris were deposited around the hearth and pits, eventually covering the entire area to a depth of c. 0.2m. An L-shaped foundation trench surrounded the features and was filled with large amounts of hammer scale and other metalworking debris. At the western end of the site there were three additional hearths or furnaces and several flat-based rectangular pits that contained occasional amounts of slag and copper waste.
