EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Offaly
‘Ballinderry II’ (Ballynahinch td.), Co. Offaly
Early Medieval Crannog.
Grid Ref: N21663886 (221665/238869)
SMR No: OF001-001
Excavation Licence: E000006
Excavation Duration/Year: 1933.
Site Director: H. O’N. Hencken (Harvard Archaeological Expedition).
The Bronze Age and early medieval crannog of Ballinderry No. 2, Co. Offaly was situated in a
marshy bog, on the Offaly/Westmeath border. The site was excavated by the Harvard
expedition in 1933 (Fig. 252). The site had been known since the nineteenth century, when it
was dug into by treasure hunters and antiquarians searching for objects. The site has since
been the subject of significant and complex structural and chronological re-interpretations,
which will be summarised below. These re-interpretations indicate that the site was first used
as a late Bronze Age platform, perhaps with a ritual function (Phase 1). The early medieval
site history included a sixth-century pre-crannog occupation phase (Phase 2) and a ninthcentury
crannog (Phase 3). The early medieval site was initially located on a naturally raised
area in either shallow water or marshy, swampy ground, which progressively became wetter,
becoming a open lake by the end of the early middle ages.
Phase 1 – Late Bronze Age site
In Phase 1, Hencken proposed that the late Bronze Age settlement had a single large
rectangular structure, several post clusters, a stone and brushwood feature and a number of
circular wicker structures in a thin black deposit of lake muds. The finds from the Bronze Age
lake settlement included bronze and stone artefacts and the sherds of several pottery vessels.
The animal bone from the site included cattle, pig, sheep/goat, horse, red deer, badger,
otter, crane, wild duck, scaup, duck and cat. The site was then partially covered by a
subsequent layer of white marl, prior to its use in the early Middle Ages. However, Newman
suggests, on the basis of a complex re-interpretation of the site stratigraphy, that the stone
and brushwood feature and the circular wicker structures are later, intrusive features which
derive from an early medieval (sixth century A.D.) pre-crannog occupation horizon. He also
suggests that a second, substantial rectangular wooden structure can be traced in the gridlike
alignment, spacing and orientation of posts at the opposite side of the site. Indeed, the
majority of the late Bronze Age finds (i.e. most of the coarse ware pottery, all the amber
beads and lignite bracelets) came from this area, suggesting it also was an area of intense
activity around a former structure. This second timber structure may have rotted away or
alternatively, it was disassembled, possibly because the wooden beams were better
preserved on this higher part of the site (a knoll) and could be re-used elsewhere.
Newman’s significant re-interpretation implies that the late Bronze Age lake-settlement had
two substantial wooden structures, a possible pathway linking them, with the build-up on the
site of an occupation layer. Finds from the site included bronze knives, awls, a flesh hook and
a possible sunflower pin shaft. Other finds included spindle whorls, a saddle quern, stone
rubbers, wooden artefacts and leather. Three human skulls were found in the black layer
beneath the wooden structures. While Hencken suggested that there were eight or nine pots
amongst the three hundred plus sherds, Newman’s recent examination of the rim profiles
indicates that there may have been as many as seventeen pottery vessels. Late Bronze Age
finds are also known from several places in the immediate vicinity of the Ballinderry 2 site. A
hoard of bronze objects (including a socketed, looped spearhead, two socketed gouges, a
socketed and tanged chisel, a socketed knife and three large rings) was found in 1944 at
2.5m depth in peat, possibly in Moyvoughly bog. A late Bronze Age cup-headed pin and a
bronze ring was also found, possibly in association with cremated bone, from a site 400m to
the north of Ballinderry 2. Various other items of late Bronze Age date including tools,
weaponry and ornaments have also been reported from the site in the NMI files, although
some of these may have been deliberately mis-provenanced so as to increase their value.
Phase 2 – early medieval pre-crannog occupation phase (sixth century AD)
In the Phase 2 occupation (according to Newman’s re-interpretation), probably dating to the
late sixth century AD, the site had an early medieval occupation surface apparently used as
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