2012:027 - CLINTY QUARRY, Clinty and Clougher, Antrim

Monitoring uncovered three pits. The north-westernmost pit was large, oval, flat based and contained four loose charcoal-flecked fills, the earliest of which contained one undecorated piece of prehistoric pottery, and a large number of large angular stones. The pit measured 0.86m x 0.67m x 0.34m orientated north to south. The stones were not packing stones, did not line the pit and there were no voids amongst the stones. The function of the stones or why they were buried is unknown. Also recovered from the upper, charcoal-rich fill were two pieces of struck flint/debitage and a large piece of decorated pottery. Eighteen metres south-east of this pit was a shallow sub-oval pit which measured 1.3m x 0.9m x 0.02m to 0.17m orientated east to west and contained one fill within which were three sherds of undecorated prehistoric pottery. One metre south was the last feature, a sub-circular pit which measured 1.21m x 1.16m x 0.28m, orientated north to south. Within the single fill three sherds of prehistoric undecorated pottery were recovered.
The pottery from within the three features suggest a Neolithic date for the site, and given the small amount of decoration on one of the pieces it is possible that these are Middle Neolithic in date. As these three features are well isolated in the area and are certainly not part of a single structure, it is unknown what their function would have been.

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