County: Meath Site name: Balreask Old/Athlumney, Navan
Sites and Monuments Record No.: ME025–039 Licence number: 07E1117
Author: Ellen O’Carroll with Faith Bailey, for Irish Archaeological Consultancy Ltd, 120b Greenpark Road, Bray, Co. Wicklow.
Site type: No archaeological significance
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 688377m, N 762665m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.606367, -6.664579
Testing was undertaken in advance of the proposed pipeline crossing of the Boyne River at Kilcarne, Navan. This pipeline will form part of Contract 2 (Kilcarne to Carn Hill Pipelines and Carn Hill and Proudstown Reservoirs) and will be constructed as part of the Navan mid-Meath water supply scheme. This programme of assessment was undertaken as a result of recommendations made within an archaeological assessment by Yvonne Whitty of Contract 2 of the Navan mid-Meath water supply scheme, which incorporated testing results at the site of the proposed Carn Hill reservoir (Excavations 2006, No. 1610, 06E0761). The location of the proposed river crossing at Kilcarne was identified during this assessment as an area of archaeological potential, due to the presence of the River Boyne.
Test-trenching took place on 19 and 20 February 2008, using a mechanical excavator equipped with a flat, toothless bucket. A total of sixteen trenches were excavated within the area of the proposed pipeline. Although a number of archaeological sites have been recorded along the banks of the River Boyne (ME025–039, ME025–036, ME025–049) in close vicinity to the proposed river crossing at Kilcarne (within the townlands of Balreask Old and Athlumney), no features of archaeological significance were discovered during this programme of testing.
