2006:1736 - KILTEASHEEN, Roscommon

The second field season at Kilteasheen, Knockvicar, Co. Roscommon, ran over five weeks between May and June 2006 and was in most ways a spectacular success. The excavation was generously funded by the Royal Irish Academy with continuing support from the Heritage Council for the ongoing programme of topographical and geophysical surveying.

Building upon the encouraging results of the first field season in 2005 (Excavations 2005, No. 1339), a number of new areas were investigated in 2006, leading to some surprising findings and necessitating a radical reworking of the tentative phasing and interpretations offered in the 2005 stratigraphic report.

During the 2005 field season, three cuttings were excavated across the site. These cuttings targeted the features of greatest interest on the site, including the building identified as the medieval parish church and the platform, a rectilinear raised area surrounded by a ditch measuring roughly 20m by 20m located 50m from the church (R0006–012 and R0006–013(02) respectively). The platform was originally perceived as the possible location of the 13th-century cuirt mentioned in the annals. A number of potential archaeological features were identified on the platform during the 2004 and 2005 geophysical surveys, including a substantial stone wall delimiting the perimeter of the platform and considerable amounts of rubble. While the cutting within the church (Cutting C) revealed little of interest, the two cuttings situated on the platform (Cuttings A and B) were much more fruitful.

Cutting A, stretching across the north-east corner of the platform and surrounding ditch, revealed the bottom course of the perimeter wall’s foundation, the medieval ditch and, either at the base of the ditch or in an even lower feature, the remains of two humans. Stratigraphically these two burials appeared below the cut of the medieval ditch and were directly associated with a barbed and tanged arrowhead. While there have been a number of lithic finds from across the site including those from medieval contexts, the evidence that these burials were in an earlier feature and that the skeletons were substantially more robust than the other human remains revealed in Cutting B added to the initial interpretation of the burials being possibly prehistoric, or at least earlier than the hypothesised 13th-century platform.

Cutting B revealed a section of the perimeter wall, with at least three phases of burials located inside the wall. The uppermost phase of burials appeared to lack definite grave-cuts and revealed three artefacts (two silver pennies and a bronze dress pin) dating to the 14th century, giving us a likely end date to the burial activity. The burials were sealed by a rubble layer containing a number of architectural fragments heavily decorated in the Romanesque style and dating roughly to the period ad 1170–1190 (R. Moss pers. comm.) on stylistic grounds. While Cuttings A and C were completed in 2005, Cutting B was unfinished owing to the number and density of burials. Apart from the bare suggestion of an earlier wall under the perimeter wall in Cutting B, no evidence for the cuirt or any other structural remains was revealed on the platform. While the jury was still out as to whether the platform was the location of the cuirt, it appeared likely that it had served as the location for the cemetery associated with the adjacent church in the 14th century and probably before.

For the 2006 field season, it was decided to focus on other areas of the site, with the exception of the completion of Cutting B, so as to avoid disturbing any further burials on the platform. In addition to the completion of Cutting B, four other cuttings were proposed, including Cuttings D–G.

Cutting D would be located at the western end of the interior of the church, principally to confirm the lack of any surviving original features or other archaeological activity inside the building.

Cutting E comprised a long narrow trench that extended north from the platform to facilitate the investigation of the medieval ditch, a possible trackway and a likely second ditch identified during the geophysical survey.

Cutting F involved an extension to Cutting A following the line of the medieval ditch. Its purpose was to reveal the remainder of the two burials identified in Cutting A while simultaneously examining their stratigraphic relationship with the platform and ditch.

Cutting G would target the remains of a stone-built structure revealed during the removal of brush from an area immediately west of the platform.

With the exception of Cutting E, all of the other cuttings revealed a substantial number of burials. In addition, again with the exception of Cutting E, none of the other cuttings could be completed during the 2006 field season. The location and nature of the burial activity has necessitated a major reworking of the archaeological interpretation of the site. Cutting D, within the ‘church’, has revealed some possible original features, including the partial remains of a floor and what appear to be later industrial activity and two child burials, which are probably later insertions.

Both Cuttings F and G have revealed a number of burials. In Cutting F, the burials are in very poor condition and appear not to have graves, having simply been covered by a number of dump layers in a haphazard fashion. All of the burials in Cutting F are located over the filled-in medieval ditch excavated in Cutting A in 2005. Thus, neither the medieval ditch nor the earlier burials sealed by the ditch were reached in Cutting F in 2006. In Cutting G, the excavation of what soon appeared to be the remains of a much later building revealed, in the most shocking fashion, a huge number of burials located directly beneath the flagstone floor and clearly extending under the walls of the building. Within the internal portion of the building excavated in 2006, measuring c. 3m by 2m, eighteen burials were revealed. They were laid east–west in a slightly more organised fashion than those revealed in Cutting F and comprised many children and adolescent burials. However, the burials were clearly not placed in individual grave-cuts, similar to those in Cutting F and the latest phase of burial in Cutting B. The shocking aspect revealed through the excavation of Cutting G is that the builders of the structure were obviously fully aware they were building directly atop a large number of human graves, with some of the skulls having been crushed pancake flat by the flagstones.

While further work will obviously be necessary to fully explain the archaeology revealed to date, some changes to our initial interpretations are in order. First, it is becoming more and more likely that the building formerly known as the church may not have been a church. The dimensions are unusual, being too wide for the standard medieval parish church. There is no obvious entrance in the remaining walls and, with the exception of what are two, probably later, child burials, no major burial activity as normally found inside a medieval parish church.

It is now possible that this building could in fact be the remains of the 13th-century bishop’s palace or cuirt mentioned in the annals. This is supported by the constant historical association of the name ‘Bishop’s Seat’, not only with the site in general but with this building in particular, on all editions of the OS maps. Evidence revealed elsewhere on site also supports this interpretation.

The amount of burial activity found on and around the platform, in addition to the presence of huge quantities of rubble and the decorated architectural stone, may indicate that the platform was the actual location of the medieval church that is known to have been present on the site from the late 12th to early 14th centuries. The burial activity revealed in Cuttings F and G, in addition to the upper level of burials in Cutting B, indicate that the final episode of medieval activity on the site probably constitutes an episode of mass burial. This is supported by the sheer number and density of burials, the lack of identifiable grave-cuts and the extreme shallowness of the burials. The association of three 14th-century artefacts with this phase of burial indicates a probable date for the activity and a possible association with the Black Death, which is known to have struck Moylurg in AD 1349.

While no further datable medieval finds have been retrieved, the overall number of prehistoric lithic artefacts and debitage have quadrupled. The sheer number of these finds from what are principally medieval contexts indicates a likely substantial concentration of prehistoric archaeology in the immediate area of the platform. While it seems less likely that the burials revealed at the base of the medieval ditch in Cutting A in 2005 are prehistoric, a number of features cut by the medieval ditches in Cutting E may be very early.

At the end of the 2006 field season, all of the apparent burials in Cutting F had been removed, although the top of the medieval ditch had yet to be reached. One skeleton remains to be removed in Cutting B, where there is evidence of further archaeological layers beneath the redeposited natural that constitutes the platform. In Cutting G, where eighteen burials were revealed, only four were removed. The excavation of these burials was particularly hampered by their density, the more fragile nature of the remains and the fact that they were damaged by the later flagstones. There is some indication that there are further burials located beneath the eighteen identified in the top layer. The level of the possible original floor was only revealed in the southern half of Cutting D, with the northern half stalled due to the presence of two child burials and a rough stone surface probably associated with industrial activity.

Cloonfad Cottage, Cloonfad, Carrick-on-Shannon, Co. Leitrim