County: Dublin Site name: Tankardstown
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 08E0847
Author: Ellen O’Carroll, 8 Cumberland Street, Dun Laoghaire, Co. Dublin.
Site type: Industrial remains
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 719679m, N 762543m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.599059, -6.191859
The development site at Tankardstown, Balbriggan, is located on an elevated position with extensive views of the surrounding countryside and the Irish Sea. There are no known monuments recorded from within the development site. However, the poorly preserved remains of a late 19th/early 20th-century brick kiln stand towards the south-west corner of the field. Under current development plans, this will be removed.
A geophysical survey was carried out in September (licence 08R0213) but no large-scale archaeological activity was identified. Occasional isolated pit-type responses from across the surveyed areas were flagged as being potentially archaeological in nature. In addition, a series of linear features thought to be the remains of post-medieval field boundaries and a trackway, marked on the 1906 edition of the OS 25-inch map, were identified.
During the subsequent testing phase of work, a total of eighteen trenches were opened using a 20-tonne track machine with a 2m-wide grading bucket. No archaeological features were uncovered. However, activity associated with the brick-making was identified but confined to the immediate area around the remains of the kiln. A mound at the top of the hill at the southern boundary of the development site proved to be landfill. Trenches at the eastern, centre and western sides of the mound showed that the dumped material extended well below the level of subsoil, indicating that no archaeological features would have survived here.
It is recommended that a record of the brick kiln be made before its removal, comprising a written and photographic description. Otherwise, no archaeological remains were identified.
