EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Cork
Carrigillihy, Co. Cork
Early Medieval Settlement Enclosure
Grid Ref: W22363255 (122363/032559)
SMR No: CO142-091001
Excavation Licence: N/A
Excavation Duration/Year: 1951
Site Director: M.J. O’Kelly (University College Cork)
Excavation was undertaken in the early-1950s by M. J. O’Kelly of University College Cork and
financed by means of a Special Employment Scheme. The site was located just above the
15m contour mark on gently west-east sloping ground, 45m to the west of a series of
indented cliffs along the western side of Glandore harbour.
Excavation revealed a possible early medieval square house superimposed upon the ruins of
an earlier possible Bronze Age oval house associated with a stone enclosure (Fig. 62). The
primary phase of occupation consisted of an oval house within a low oval stone-built bank.
The stone bank (24m by 21m) was 1.2m high and 2.75m thick at its best preserved points
and contained a core of loose stones and occasional orthostats faced with small flanking slabs
at various places. The eastern entrance contained a roughly cobbled area and a gate
identified as two stone-packed postholes, set 1.06m apart between the stone bank terminals.
The interior contained a stone-built oval-shaped house (internal dimensions 10.05m by
6.70m) with an eastern doorway directly opposite the enclosure entrance.
A spread of unbroken habitation refuse extended out from the floor of the house and across
the open space to abut against the lower courses of the inner face of the enclosure,
suggesting the house and enclosure were contemporary. The finds (pottery sherds, a bronze
awl, a stone disc, two hone stones, perforated slabs and flint pieces) from the habitation
refuse and occupation deposits and pits inside the house suggest the primary phase of
occupation was during the Bronze Age. A sterile grey-white leached deposit sealed all these
occupation deposits.
The secondary phase of occupation was marked by a stone-built house, square externally
(8.5m x 8.5m) with rounded corners. The dry-stone walls were on average 1.4m thick, and
survived to a maximum height of 0.60m. The building contained two opposing doorways
which were defined by one posthole each. Large internal postholes suggest that posts at the
corners and centre of the house supported a wooden or thatched roof. A layer of habitation
refuse, flecked with charcoal, was recovered across the whole floor of the house.
The stone-built enclosing bank appears to have ceased to function as a protective barrier
during the secondary occupation phase. The southeast-facing door of the secondary house
was roughly opposite the eastern enclosure entrance though there appears to have been no
attempt to repair or rebuild the gateway at this point; the opposite doorway, however, had
no corresponding entrance through the enclosure.
The enclosure bank was much collapsed (less than 0.6m) and its inner facing removed at this
point, suggesting that the inhabitants of this secondary house simply passed in and over this
particular stretch of bank. The abundance of stone from the collapsed walls of the enclosure
and primary house may have attracted the secondary occupants to this site.
The finds from the secondary phase were all recovered outside the secondary house and
suggest an early medieval date. A fragment of a shale bracelet was recovered immediately to
the south-west of the secondary house in the same habitation refuse deposit associated
within this building. Fragments of two rotary querns were found near the inner face of the
south bank above the grey-white leached deposit.
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