County: Cork Site name: BURNFORT
Sites and Monuments Record No.: CO042–051(01); 042–051(02) Licence number: 09E0006
Author: Deborah Sutton, Sheila Lane & Associates, Deanrock Business Park, Togher, Cork.
Site type: Ringfort and souterrain
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 558892m, N 590650m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.066273, -8.599543
Two test-trenches were hand excavated within a ringfort (CO042–051001) at Burnfort, Co. Cork, in order to investigate the validity of a local tradition that the ringfort and associated souterrain had been a children’s burial place. The excavations took place as part of the Environmental Impact Assessment prepared for the M20 Cork to Limerick motorway. The investigations followed a high-resolution topographical survey of the ringfort and high-resolution geophysical (magnetometry and earth resistance) surveys. The latter revealed some dispersed pit-like features that may have derived from grave cuts. The survey results informed the location of the two 15m-long by 1.5m-wide test-trenches.
In Trench 1 a dark-brown, friable and largely stone-free topsoil up to 0.45m thick overlaid an orange sandy boulder clay. Redeposited subsoil was noted at both the southern and northern extremities of the trench and in patches along the eastern side of the trench and this appears to represent the redeposition of soils from the original excavation of the souterrain. Two stake-holes, a possible pit (semicircular and 0.5m diameter), and two southwest/north-east furrows were noted in the subsoil.
In Trench 2 a similar depth of topsoil overlaid boulder clay within which seven furrows were exposed, five of which were orientated southwest/north-east. The stake-holes and possible pit probably relate to the occupation of the ringfort, probably in the early medieval period. The furrows, including two intercut furrows, indicate that there was more than one phase of agricultural activity, probably in the late 18th or early 19th century. The current landowner, now in his eighties, has never ploughed the ringfort, suggesting that the ground was ploughed quite some time ago, probably in the 19th century, when all available land was cultivated for food. The first and third editions of the OS maps for the area show that the ringfort interior was wooded from at least the mid-19th to the first half of the 20th century, suggesting that cultivation of this area predates the planting of trees. There was no evidence to corroborate the tradition of human burials within the site, nor was there any evidence of the pit-like anomalies identified during the geophysical survey.
