What is recorded here

Half a kilometre of ordinary Kildare soil hid a shallow pit where human and animal bones lay beside Beaker pottery and a tiny chert arrowhead. The pit sat eighty metres east of three Neolithic houses, suggesting that the living and dead shared one restless landscape. Quarry men nearly erased it in 1997, but archaeology snapped the soil open again. What was buried there may have been love, loss, sacrifice or merely the practical end of a life; the bones no longer argue about it.

In 1997, archaeological monitoring (Excavation Licence No. 97E0449) of soil-stripping in advance of the development of a large scale sand and gravel quarry identified a pit which was subsequently fully excavated (Excavation Licence No. 98E0094: Purcell 2001, 83). It lay c. 80m E of three Neolithic houses (KD023-114001-, KD023-114002- and KD023-114003-). The shallow sub-circular pit (D 0.23m; 1.25m E-W; 1.18m N-S) had a U-shaped profile and produced evidence of in situ burning and contained both human and animal bones, numerous sherds of Beaker pottery, which represented two vessels, burnt flint and a tiny chert barbed and tanged arrow head. Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy Date of upload: 21 December 2012

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