County: Leitrim Site name: BREDAGH, Carrigallen
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 06E0345
Author: Christopher Read, North West Archaeological Services
Site type: Pit
Period/Dating: Undetermined
ITM: E 623612m, N 802353m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.969924, -7.640119
The site of the proposed development is located within Bredagh townland on the southern outskirts of Carrigallen village, Co. Leitrim. The proposed development consists of twenty houses in a large open field of c. six acres. The site is not located close to any known monuments. Unlicensed monitoring of topsoil removal revealed, within a proposed green space, two small features beneath the topsoil and cutting the subsoil. These features were subsequently fully excavated under licence.
Feature 1 consisted of a small subcircular pit filled with charcoal-enriched soil. It measured 0.45m (east–west) by 0.48m and 0.15m deep. The pit was filled with black charcoal-enriched soil containing frequent large pieces of iron slag. It also contained frequent small, hard and compact black fragments. The largest of these are c. 15mm by 10mm and, when crushed, splinter in a way reminiscent of charcoal. It is possible these pieces are mineralised charcoal. The natural around the top of the feature is fire-reddened, indicating burning in situ. Feature 2 comprised a narrow linear feature located 6m to the south-east of Feature 1. This measured 0.6m (north-east/south-west) by 2.3m and 0.1m deep. It was filled by very dark-brown charcoal-enriched soil containing the same type of slag identified in F1. The edges of the feature are denoted by fire-reddened natural. It appears to be related to F1. No datable finds were retrieved.
Cloonfad Cottage, Cloonfad, Carrick-on-Shannon, Co. Leitrim
