2007:40 - Crew Hill, Antrim

Excavation was undertaken at two sites on Crew Hill, near Glenavy, Co. Antrim, in order to facilitate the proposed expansion of Northern Ireland Water’s facilities on the hill. Analysis of the placename evidence demonstrates that Crew Hill is the probable Gaelic inauguration site of Cráeb Telcha (Flanagan 1970), which historical and literary sources indicate was a royal assembly place of the Ulaid, as well as the site of a sacred tree (FitzPatrick 2004, 37–38; Macdonald and McIlreavy 2008, 10–14). The identification of Crew Hill as a place of inauguration is supported by local tradition and the presence upon the hill’s summit and southern slopes of a number of features potentially associated with inauguration rites, including: a glacial erratic known as the Crew Stone (ANT063–057), a ‘stone chair’ (ANT063–058), a bivallate rath (ANT063–020) and an apparently ‘ancient’ mound (ANT063–101). In addition, 19th-century accounts of the discovery of stone-lined burials (O’Laverty 1880, 295) and the partial excavation of a possible Neolithic feature during an evaluative excavation on the hill’s summit (below No. 41, AE/07/61) suggest that Crew Hill may have been the focus of other episodes of prehistoric and early medieval activity.
Several potential elements of the inaugural landscape of Crew Hill were selected for excavation. They were situated within two general locations. Site A is a near rectangular-shaped field on the summit of Crew Hill and contains the Crew Stone, two linear anomalies imaged in an earlier magnetometry survey (Noel 2004) and a field quarry which has been identified as the possible site of the burials discovered in the 19th century. The Crew Stone is a basalt glacial erratic (maximum dimension 1.5m), which local tradition maintains was an inauguration stone. Excavation demonstrated that the stone was physically overlying a large rock-cut pit that was interpreted as having been dug and then rapidly backfilled by treasure-hunters. A relatively recent date for the feature was suggested by the recovery of two sherds of 17th- or 18th-century pottery from its primary fill. The original excavation of this pit would have destroyed any archaeological horizons associated with the Crew Stone’s use as an inauguration stone.
The trenches excavated across the geophysical anomalies established that they were the product of variations in the surface of the underlying bedrock and not a reflection of any archaeological features. Excavation along part of the edge of the field quarry, which was thought could possibly be the site of the 19th-century discovery of stone-lined graves on the hill’s summit, uncovered no traces of additional burials. However, artefactual material consistent with a date for the quarry’s abandonment by the mid-19th century was recovered.
Site B, which was located on the southern slope of Crew Hill, is a terraced area whose base contains a low mound that had been previously identified as a feature associated with inauguration (Totten 1980, 30; FitzPatrick 2004, 38). The mound was investigated in a single cutting, which demonstrated that it was an upstanding area of bedrock within a quarry of 18th- or 19th-century date.
The excavations demonstrated that the archaeological identification of elements of an inaugural landscape is a problematic exercise. Technically, the excavations were successful; closely datable artefacts from diagnostic contexts were recovered from relatively small trenches enabling a detailed understanding of the excavated stratigraphic sequences to be confidently produced. Historically, however, the results were disappointing in that no fresh insights were gained into the character of Crew Hill as a place of royal assembly and probable Gaelic inauguration.
References
FitzPatrick, E. 2004 Royal inauguration in Gaelic Ireland c. 1100–1600. Woodbridge.
Flanagan, D. 1970 Cráeb Telcha: Crew, Co. Antrim. Dinnseanchas 4 (2), 29–32.
Macdonald, P. and McIlreavy, D. 2008 Site evaluation and excavation at Crew Hill (Cráeb Telcha), near Glenavy, County Antrim 2007. Report No. 56, Queen’s University, Belfast, Belfast.
Noel, M.J. 2004 Geophysical survey on an area of proposed extension to a reservoir at Crew Hill, County Antrim, Northern Ireland. GeoQuest Associates.
O’Laverty, J. 1880 An historical account of the diocese of Down and Conor, ancient and modern. Vol. II. Dublin.
Totten, J. 1980 Gleanings from Glenavy parish. Newcastle (Co. Down).