County: Offaly Site name: Monasteroris, Edenderry
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 07E0383 ext.
Author: Eoin Sullivan, Gort Archaeology, Tullamore, Co. Offaly.
Site type: Pit
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 660859m, N 732891m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.342753, -7.086073
The development site is located on the north-west side of Edenderry town in Monasteroris townland. The site was subject to pre-development test excavation (see No. 1011 above) and subsequent monitoring of groundworks associated with the construction of the site access road, associated drainage works and attenuation tank. It is near a ringfort, OF012–002. The groundworks associated with the first phase of construction of the industrial units took place between 21 and 30 May 2008. Monitoring was carried out as an extension to the excavation licence.
The monitoring of Blocks 6 and 7 resulted in the identification of three small isolated features within both the footprint and the vicinity of the perimeter of Block 7. Two of the features appeared to be modern and related to modern/natural burning in the field. The third feature was an irregularly shaped pit and represented in situ burning in the field and was of archaeological significance. The pit was sectioned and measured 0.69m (north–south) by 0.6m. The single fill of the pit consisted of blackened clay containing occasional pieces of charcoal overlying fire-reddened subsoil. No artefacts were identified in the fill or were encountered in the removal of topsoil and there was a general lack of the typical modern wares associated with agricultural fields.
