County: Galway Site name: Liskelly
Sites and Monuments Record No.: GA099-135 Licence number: 17E0056
Author: Anne Carey
Site type: Adjacent to enclosure
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 580355m, N 725091m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.275790, -8.294540
Seven trenches were excavated at the site of the proposed dwelling house development, located to the south-west of the site of a destroyed enclosure. The remains of two depressions were found in two trenches in the north-eastern area of the site of the proposed development. These depressions, comprising a ‘V’-shaped depression with a width of 2.3m and a broad ‘U’-shaped depression with a width of 5.6m, occurred in Trenches 6 and 7 respectively, at a remove of 10m from each other. Finds of 18th-century date were discovered in both depressions. These comprised a distinctive Georgian wine-glass stem in the fill of the depression in Trench 6 and a clay pipe bowl in the fill excavated in the depression in Trench 7. The fill of both depressions was homogenous, having neither layers or lenses indicating silting or sporadic infill over time.
Given their location, close to the point where an enclosure, possibly a ringfort, was marked on the historic maps, it is likely they are the sub-surface remains of this feature, but the finds from the fills indicate human activity at the site as late as the 18th century. No artefactual evidence or features relating to pre-1700 activity at the site were discovered and, though broadly in line with each other, the disparity in the sizes of the two depressions makes a clear classification difficult.
80 Portacarron, Ballymoneen Road, Galway
