2008:1183 - Castlegore, Tyrone

A decorated Late Bronze Age gold dress fastener was found by the landowner in the townland of Castlegore, Co. Tyrone, in April 2008. There are no known monuments of this period in the immediate vicinity of the findspot. No aboveground earthworks or features are visible in the area nor have any other finds indicative of earlier human occupation been found close by. A range of methodologies was employed by the Centre for Archaeological Fieldwork, on behalf of the Northern Ireland Environment Agency, to investigate the site of the find. These comprised: a soil resistivity and magnetometry survey of a 8100m2 square centred on the findspot; a systematic traverse of the same area with a metal detector; and the excavation of an evaluation trench (3m by 4m) opened over the approximate findspot.
None of the responses in the geophysical surveys could be categorically considered to be due to archaeological features and the small excavation also uncovered no features (ploughsoil of 0.3m depth, directly overlying the stony subsoil). The metal-detector survey returned a total of 50 positive ferrous and non-ferrous targets. All of these were investigated but none of the metal finds were of precious metals or of any great antiquity.
The combined results of these three investigative techniques proved negative in terms of establishing a context for the gold object. This would suggest that, like many other Late Bronze Age gold and bronze finds, the Castlegore object must also be treated as a stray find, although the possibility that archaeological features have been overlooked cannot be ruled out.