County: Waterford Site name: Farrangarret
Sites and Monuments Record No.: WD040-025002 Licence number: 19E0071
Author: Bruce Sutton of Rubicon Heritage Ltd
Site type: Test trenching
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 618527m, N 577543m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 51.949670, -7.730487
Test excavations were required in advance of a planning application for a proposed housing development at the Cloisters, Farrangarret, Ardmore, Co. Waterford (Planning File Ref. No. 18/502). The proposed erection of 36 dwellings comprising of two 2-storey semi-detached dwellings and 2 mid-terrace dwellings, new landscaping and boundary treatments, connection to existing estate road (The Cloisters) together with all associated site works and foul and surface water drainage connections.
WA040-025002 (Mound) and WA040-25001 (Enclosure) are located within the immediate vicinity of the proposed development site. The footprint of the proposed development is within the constraints area of WD040-025002.
A Geophysical Survey (Fluxgate Magnetometry) was undertaken in November 2018 (detection licence 18R0230). The area subject to survey measured approximately 2.8 ha. This identified geophysical anomalies that have a high, medium and low potential to represent buried archaeological features.
Targeted test trenching of the proposed development site was carried out on 7-8 February 2019. A number of agricultural features which pre-date the current field layout, and several possibly archaeological features, were uncovered in the northern part of the site, along with one sherd of possible prehistoric pottery and flints.
The linear features uncovered in the western area represent an old ridge and furrow, or lazy-bed field system; the wall probably represents the old field north-south field boundary line visible on historic Ordnance Survey 6” and 25” mapping.
The linear features uncovered in the eastern area may also relate to field drainage and field boundaries. However, the possible pit/post-holes, hearth and stake-holes would suggest an area of archaeological significance to the north-east area of the development. The presence of worked flint and poor-quality hand-made pottery suggest a prehistoric date for these features.
It is unclear how the outlying features in trenches relate this this activity, and it is possible that the site has seen use over multiple periods, especially with its location on a flat plateau at the base of a steep north-facing slope. the site's proximity to the major monastic site at Ardmore means that an early medieval date cannot be ruled out.
Rubicon Heritage Services Ltd., Unit 2 Europa Enterprise Park, Midleton, Co. Cork P25 TV25
