County: Meath Site name: Knowth
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 17E0447
Author: Denis Shine
Site type: Testing/burnt mound
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 699418m, N 773681m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.703348, -6.494282
Pre-development testing was undertaken at the site of a proposed house extension in the townland of Knowth, County Meath. The test excavation was undertaken to inform a Request for Further Information from Meath Local Authorities (Planning reference LB/161158). Testing was the preferred mitigation strategy after the site was inspected, by JM Leigh Surveys, and deemed unsuitable for geophysical survey.
Testing was undertaken over a single day when 4 test trenches were excavated. Trench 2, excavated broadly from north-east to south-west, to the immediate east of the existing vernacular structure on the site, contained a single archaeological feature, a pit and its associated fills. The pit was encountered at the south-western extreme of Trench 2; an extension of the trench, measuring 3.2m east to west by 2.5m, was excavated on the trench's southern baulk to investigate the feature.
The oval-shaped pit orientated broadly east to west, measuring 1.77m x 1.34m x 0.3m, contained two fills. The basal fill, a grey silty clay, with frequent inclusions of charcoal and heat-shattered sandstone, as well as occasional animal bone, was found to contain a single flaked flint artefact. The fill appears to have been deposited to backfill the pit; it may derive from the waste product of burning/cooking activity related to a Fulacht Fiadh or similar in the immediate vicinity potentially dating from the later Neolithic/Early Bronze Age periods.
The results indicate the presence of buried archaeological features surviving subsurface in the area of the proposed house extension. As such, the potential for archaeology to occur in all areas of the site was considered high, especially considering the site's location only 500m from Knowth Passage Tomb. It was recommended that all areas of proposed ground disturbance be subject to full archaeological resolution prior to the proposed development, including soil stripping and full excavation of any features in advance of any construction works.
Number 2, Saint Brendan Street, Birr
