County: Meath Site name: HEATHTOWN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 10E0463
Author: Kieran Campbell, 6 St Ultans, Laytown, Co. Meath.
Site type: Adjacent to embanked enclosure
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 710482m, N 762481m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.600521, -6.330764
An assessment, consisting of geophysical survey and test-trenching, was carried out on a site for a house at The Hall in the townland of Heathtown, Stamullin, in compliance with a request for further information. Topographically the site is on the lower northern slope of Fourknocks ridge, an area with numerous prehistoric monuments, notably the passage tombs at Fourknocks and embanked enclosures or henges at Fourknocks, Micknanstown and Heathtown. The development site is within 50m of the western circuit of ME033–025 (embanked enclosure), located across the road to the east in the townlands of Fourknocks and Micknanstown.
A geophysical survey by Landscape & Geophysical Services (consent number 10-R–144) reported that there were no coherent geophysical anomalies that immediately could be interpreted as being due to subsurface archaeology, that the area surveyed was quite noisy magnetically and that there were features which could be due either to shallow weathered geology, modern disturbed ground or rubbish and that these features could mask archaeology. Extensive test-trenching revealed topsoil over undisturbed subsoil of sandy clay and the weathered surface of shale bedrock.
