County: Donegal Site name: Cooley ecclesiastical complex
Sites and Monuments Record No.: DG 021-008001 Licence number: 16E0334
Author: Max Adams and Colm O'Brien, Bernician Studies Group
Site type: Early medieval monastic
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 659783m, N 938366m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 55.188941, -7.061199
An 8m x 3m trench was excavated in the field north-west of the cemetery at Cooley, Moville, County Donegal. The cemetery contains a well-known stone shrine or 'skull house' and has been subject to detailed survey by the Bernician Studies Group over several years. The excavation successfully identified the line of the outer enclosure (previously identified by magnetometry survey), which yielded considerable complexity, including a palisade trench inserted into the base of a substantial ditch. In addition, stone settings edged the ditch, whose later fills had been disturbed by extensive in situ metal-working. The potential for a future major campaign of excavation inside the monastic precinct is demonstrated.
To either side of the supposed line of the outer enclosure ditch, located by magnetometry, parallel linear stone settings were revealed. These consisted of irregular thin slabs of schist set vertically, close-packed, into what may have been soft upcast from the original excavation of the ditch. There was evidence of patching with small water-worn pebbles as cobbling, and the wear of traffic along or across.
External to the enclosure ditch on the west side, partially-revealed settings of stone, and a pit filled with a very hard concretion, provided evidence that the zone was used for industrial activities after the end of the lifetime of the ditch. The uppermost ditch fill lying between the two linear stone settings was a thin slump, some 0.1m thick, of the re-worked ploughsoil. Into this a stake-hole had been driven, close to the edge of a complex metalworking feature, initially identified from a blackish linear stain, the remnants of a stone-lined flue. Excavation of the flue revealed deposits of ash and charred material and a series of small flat schist stones upcast onto the surface.
Sectioning and removal of the flue revealed a much larger, deeper pit more than 1m in diameter and full of flat stones whose matrix yielded a number of finds of ironworking debris. These included slag fragments, part of a tuyère and a plano-convex hearth base similar to those found at Carrowmore in 2013 (http://www.bernicianstudies.eu/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/BSG-Inishowen-2012-14.pdf).
The bulk of the fill of the enclosure ditch, some 3.6m broad and gently curving from south-west to north-east, was a homogenous deposit apparently introduced in only two or three dumps after a re-cutting episode which may have removed a more complex stratigraphic sequence. The deposit was so apparently sterile that its inferred origin is material which once formed a bank to the ditch: its original upcast, perhaps.
Removal of the homogenous fill revealed that an apparent palisade trench with straight sides, post settings and some internal structural complexity, had been inserted into the ditch after the accumulation of stone-free, turfy fills on either edge. The palisade trench was only revealed during the last few hours of the excavation. Such is its likely structural complexity that the decision was taken not to excavate. Initial inspection showed a dark, thin, linear stain on either side, which may represent the decayed remains of a plank lining.
The outer enclosure ditch at Cooley is of similar broad form and dimensions to that at Carrowmore, and in its last phase it, too, had been utilised for industrial activity, including probable iron-working. There the similarities end. The insertion into a monastic enclosure ditch of a palisade feature is rare. The only chronologically diagnostic find came from a deposit late in the sequence: a substantial rim sherd of Souterrain ware. A fragment of possibly Early Medieval pale blue glass will be sent for identification in due course. That the massive enclosure ditch (more than 3m wide and perhaps 1.5m deep) enjoyed a complex life history is beyond doubt. Primary ditch fills offering dating and environmental evidence and sealed beneath the palisade trench must be anticipated during future work. The presence of such a feature marks Cooley as a possible candidate for a reused prehistoric enclosure.
For interim report see http://www.bernicianstudies.eu/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Cooley-eval-exc-interim-2016.pdf
Dunadd, West Law Road, Shotley Bridge, County Durham DH8 0EH
