2024:871 - Kilnalehin Abbey, Galway

The manual test excavation of two further grave plots in a graveyard adjacent to Kilnalehin Abbey (RMP No. GA125-058) was carried out in June and July 2024. The project concerned consent from the National Monuments Service to allow further burials in a number of plots in Kilnalehin Abbey burial ground (RMP No. GA125-058001). The abbey is a National Monument (No. 554), in guardianship. The testing was requested by the National Monuments Service. The testing of two nearby plots in 2022 revealed no articulated burials and no features or deposits of archaeological significance.

The site is located in the heart of the village of Abbey in County Galway and is the only Carthusian foundation in Ireland, dating to between 1249 and 1256. The Priory was disbanded in 1321. The De Burgos enabled the Franciscans to take over the site about fifty years later. The ruined church and cloister buildings to the north probably date to the late 15th or early 16th century. There are some interesting 17th-century gravestones in the south chapel, including the Burke monument (RMP No. GA125-058004). The site may have been abandoned in the 18th century.

The two plots (numbers 1 and 3) were located within the graveyard, to the west of the remains of the abbey. Plot 1 was located along the western boundary wall of the graveyard, near its southern end. It measured 2.4m north-south by 2.4m and was excavated to 0.45-0.85m deep. Plot 3 was located a short distance to the north of Plot 1 and measured 2.4m north-south by 2m and was excavated to 0.55-0.6m deep. The spoil from both plots was subject to a metal detector survey (R000595).

Below the topsoil on the surface of Plot 3 were three disturbed layers which contained modern artefacts and disarticulated human and animal bone fragments, above natural subsoil. No articulated burials and no archaeological features or deposits were uncovered during the testing of the plot.

Below the topsoil on the surface of Plot 1 was a grey/brown friable silt loam, which contained disarticulated human and animal bone fragments and modern artefacts, and a fill which contained plastic and modern artefacts. Below these layers was a light grey/brown plastic clay which contained disarticulated human and animal bone fragments and modern pottery sherds. Below the plastic clay were two fills of a ditch feature which extended east-west across the plot. An animal bone fragment from the upper fil of the ditch produced a radiocarbon date of 16th-early 17th century AD.