2023:419 - Ballingowan, Kerry

Archaeological testing was undertaken at the end of September 2023 with regards to a proposal to construct a warehousing complex at a c.3.5ha site at Ballingowan, Tralee, Co. Kerry. The site is located at the south-east limits of Tralee town and at the westernmost limits of Ballingowan townland.

There are no known recorded monuments within the limits of the site although a cluster of three burnt mounds (KE029-306; -307 and -308) and two levelled fulachta fiadh (KE029-315 and -316) are situated in the triangular field abutting the site immediately to the north.  A series of 20 linear test trenches extending for c.2,010m was opened across the site. Stratigraphy was very similar in all trenches comprising of an average depth of 0.3-0.4m of mid-greyish brown topsoil overlaying mostly orange in colour silty sandy clay subsoil with various amounts of limestone and limestone bedrock exposed in Field 3.

One discrete area of archaeological interest was recorded in the western limits of trench T13 where initially two small potential pits (Feature 1 & Feature 2) containing charcoal-rich material were noted. A small extension (3m x 5m) was excavated in a northward direction to establish the existence of any other associated archaeological features. In that context, four additional small potential pits (Features 4 – 6) were recorded. Ultimately a double-row cluster of six potential pits (Feature 1-6) orientated in a south-east/north-west pattern was recorded.

Nothing of archaeological interest was noted in any other test trenches. Apart from a small number of 19^th/20^th-century ceramics recovered from excavated topsoil, no artefacts were recovered.