County: Meath Site name: CARRANSTOWN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 08E0670
Author: Dáire Leahy, ADS Ltd, 110 Amiens Street, Dublin 1.
Site type: Prehistoric pits
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 705362m, N 770566m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.674201, -6.405353
A series of three isolated pits were uncovered during monitoring at the site of a waste incinerator at Carranstown, near the village of Duleek, Co. Meath. These pits were excavated between October 2008 and February 2009. Each of the pits contained evidence of burning, and in the case of two of these this was in the form of burnt and heat-shattered stone. Charcoal from each of the pits returned dates of 3010–2880 cal BC, 2870–2580 cal BC and 1930–1770 cal BC (all 2 sigma). With the exception of a piece of flint microdebitage from one of the pits, no further artefactual remains were recovered from them. It is suggested that these features may have been related to more intensive activity that was revealed, to the north, at the Platin quarry.
