2010:036 - Greenisland, Antrim

As a result of trial-trenching undertaken in Phase 1 works in advance of improvements to the A2 Shore Road at Greenisland, Carrickfergus, Co. Antrim (see No. 34 above), two sites (1 and 2) were designated for full excavation under Phase 2. At Site 1, evidence for prehistoric activity was uncovered in the form of fire pits and charcoal deposits from which a substantial assemblage of worked flint artefacts was recovered, including cores, flakes and hollow scrapers, a characteristic indicator of the middle to late Neolithic in Ireland. Pottery recovered from the site was also dated to this period.
At Site 2, the features spanned a significant period of time. Prehistoric pottery was retrieved from the fill of an approximately U-shaped feature, which also showed signs of in situ burning. A number of other pits and charcoal spreads were also recorded, with one spread previously radiocarbon dated to the 11th to 13th century ad.
It appears the features recorded at Sites 1 and 2 may have survived due to their comparable locations in low-lying ground, around natural depressions such as hollows in the surface of geological deposits and silted old watercourses. Any more substantial settlement remains that would presumably have been sited on higher, better drained ground are likely to have been eroded by ploughing through shallow topsoil that was itself subject to erosion by water draining towards Belfast Lough. The artefacts associated with these do suggest more substantial settlement was once located close by but for the reasons noted above this may have been completely removed by later cultivation.
Further radiocarbon dating and artefact analysis is currently being undertaken for a forthcoming publication about the excavation.