County: Meath Site name: Dunshaughlin
Sites and Monuments Record No.: n/a Licence number: 19E0616 ext.
Author: Liam Coen c/o Archer Heritage
Site type: Testing, pits and post-hole
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 697080m, N 751450m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.504073, -6.536600
A total of 8 trenches (numbers 13-20 following on from original test excavation sequence) were excavated within the recently available area. Topsoil varied slightly between parts of the field, varying from 0.35-0.6m in depth. Subsoil was a compact light-yellow brown mixture of clay and silt, with frequent angular stones.
A single area of archaeological interest was revealed in Trench 16. The remains of a post-hole contained some occasional burnt bone flecks in its fill and beside it lay a shallow oval pit containing frequent charcoal and oxidised clay fragments that may represent a hearth. Twenty metres to the north-west lay an isolated oval pit with a depth of 0.2m.
No finds were retrieved from the test excavation so the features are undated. None of the anomalies from the earlier geophysical survey (19R0178; Target Archaeological Geophysics) were of archaeological significance.
Unit 8 Beat Centre, Balbriggan, Co. Dublin
