EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Cork
Park North, Midleton, Co. Cork
Cave
Grid Ref: W91298009 (191291/080093)
SMR No: CO076-004
Excavation Licence: N/A
Excavation Duration/Year: Summer 1942
Site Director: J.C. Coleman
Bones and signs of human habitation were discovered in an undisclosed cave near Midleton in
1865. The cave at Park North, situated at a partly quarried hollow (‘Foxes Quarry’) and
excavated in the summer of 1942, revealed evidence for an eighth/ninth century habitation
deposit, and was tentatively identified as the site of this earlier find.
Four caves entrances (A-D) were identified in the quarry face. Cave C was the largest of the
group and was selected for excavation after the opening of a test-pit (Fig. 78). It contained
an entrance- 6m wide and 3m high which led into an outer chamber (9m by 4.5m). The floor
of the outer chamber was covered with loose limestone blocks. A series of low level watertunnels
were identified in the inner tunnels of the cave. The lowest deposit of the outer
chamber of Cave C consisted of stiff alluvial clay formed by flood waters entering the cavern.
Numerous rock fragments and a quantity of animal bone- cattle (75%) followed by
sheep/goat, red deer (antler fragments), pig and dog were embedded within the deposit.
A sandy clay bed, possibly the result of prolonged and deep flooding within the cave, lay
above the stiff alluvial clay in the outer chamber of Cave C. Traces of charcoal occurred
mostly near the top of the bed but no continuous hearth was observed. The remains of
cattle, pig, and red deer (one antler tine) were recovered from this layer.
An extended thick black habitation layer of clay and charcoal (0.15m-0.28m deep) overlay the
sandy clay bed in the outer chamber. Numerous bone fragments were scattered through the
deposit and were dominated by cattle (50%), sheep or goat (45%), followed by very small
quantities of pig, red deer, hare, rabbit, dog, goose, fowl, bird and field mouse. Many of the
larger bones belonging to cattle, sheep and pig were broken in marrow extraction. A number
of thin clay layers separating the black deposit were identified in places. While this feature
was very scanty, it appears to indicate that the occupation of the cave may not have been
continuous.
The early medieval finds were all from the black habitation deposit and comprised a bone
needle, two bone pins, two portions of a decorated bone comb handle, one stone spindle
whorl, two whetstones, hammer-stone, fifteen flint fragments, iron knife point, small tanged
iron knife, iron nail or rivet, iron ‘holed knife’, bronze ring shaped object, three right angled
fragments of silvered bronze, some corroded bronze fragments and a decorated bronze bar
(possibly from a mounting of an eighth/ninth century shrine).
It was suggested that the black habitation surface dated to the eighth/ninth century A.D. The
outer chamber of Cave C was a suitable place for dwelling as it offered advantages of shelter,
adequate living space and a convenient water-supply either from the water passages in the
low level inner tunnels or from a nearby stream. The cave was subsequently abandoned as a
habitation site and the present surface of earth and stones were covered over the black layer.
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