County: Roscommon Site name: CARROWEIGHTER/BALLYDOOLEY/RUNNABACKAN
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 11E0247
Author: James B. O’Hara
Site type: Testing (enclosures and ring-ditch)
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 577408m, N 769663m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.676026, -8.341236
Stage (i)a test excavations were carried out within an emerging design corridor as part of an assessment of the overall feasibility of a proposed realignment of the N60 at Oran (Carroweighter). A total of 67 trenches, amounting to 3,097 linear metres, were excavated along the proposed route. Testing was primarily concerned with determining the character and extent of geophysical anomalies identified during a magnetometer and resistance survey undertaken by Earthsound Archaeological Geophysics (11R0074). Testing also targeted areas where there were no geophysical anomalies or where geophysical survey was not carried out owing to adverse ground conditions. All trenches were excavated to the level of subsoil or to the top of archaeological deposits, where present.
One area of archaeological potential was identified along the scheme, in Carroweighter townland. Identified sites within this area included three separate enclosures and a ring-ditch. It is not yet known whether the ring-ditch is of domestic or funerary character. A sample of animal bone in a sealed basal deposit at Enclosure 1 indicated a Late Bronze Age or Early Iron Age date (SUERC-36864; 750–410 cal. BC; 2450±30 BP). A sample of animal bone in a sealed basal deposit at Enclosure 2 indicated a Middle–Late Iron Age date (SUERC-36865; 170 cal. BC–cal. AD 10; 2060±30 BP).
Midlands Archaeological Services, 23 Congress Terrace, Longford.
