County: Limerick Site name: Skagh, Croom
Sites and Monuments Record No.: LI030-027 Licence number: 12E304
Author: Frank Coyne
Site type: Post-medieval enclosure
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 551556m, N 642272m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.529649, -8.713969
Testing was carried out from 26 to 28 September 2012, at the proposed location of a new school. Twenty-six trenches were opened across the footprint of the proposed development. All were 2m wide. No archaeological features were noted in the test trenches. The natural parent material across the site was an orange-brown boulder clay, with frequent small and medium sized stones, and occasional patches of grey gravel. The removed topsoil was metal detected, but no artefacts were recovered.
The enclosure LI030-027 was also test trenched. Two trenches were extended from the interior of the possible enclosure in a south-easterly direction. In both trenches the remains of a possible enclosing element was noted. This was a shallow cut, 1.2m wide, 0.2m deep and filled with small stones and topsoil, probably field clearance.
The open portion (eastern side) of this site appears to have been enclosed after c. 1840, as it is not marked as enclosed at this time, and only later appears to have been enclosed at the time of the 25inch map of the area. Therefore, it appears to be the remains of a small 19th-century paddock, possibly for gathering livestock, and is not archaeological in nature. The field boundary, which forms the western side of the possible enclosure LI030-027, continues to the north-east and south of the site. It is a uniform height of an average of 1m (now covered in bushes and dense undergrowth), which would suggest that this site was always just a kink in a field boundary.
Aegis Archaeology Ltd, 32 Nicholas Street, King’s Island, Limerick
