What is recorded here

Half-hidden beneath Cookstown, a wide earthen ring waited for the road to tear it open. People lived there from the early medieval period until the fourteenth century, stepping across a causeway that dropped toward water held in the ditch. When the rath emptied, its hollow did not disappear; it may have become a field boundary, marking the edge of ordinary land while carrying the shape of a forgotten home.

Situated on a knoll which is on a gentle SW-facing slope, with a small NNW-SSE stream c. 200m to the SW. This was first identified in a geophysical survey (01R0058) in advance of the N2 Finglas – Ashbourne road and by-pass (GBS Prospection 2001). Archaeological testing and excavation (03E1252) by R. Clutterbuck (2009) at Site 25 between January and May 2004 confirmed the presence of a rath at the edge of the road-take, and c. 20% of it was excavated as well as other features (excavations.ie 2004: 1211). The enclosure (ext. diam. 54m) was defined by a fosse (Wth 3.2-5.5m; D c. 1.2m) with an entrance causeway (Wth 4m) at ENE. The causeway had a lower step off its S side, perhaps to reach water in the fosse. The fosse was only excavated N-SE and there were no internal features in the excavated area. Early medieval fills of sandy clays interspersed with silts are probably slip from an internal bank, but these are separated by iron-panning from high medieval fills, and the ditch does not seem to have been finally closed until the 13th or 14th century when clays, probably from the remains of the bank, were used. A ringed pin dating from the 9th century AD and portion of another were recovered from the lower levels of the fosse. After the abandonment of the rath its fosse may even have been re-cut to act as a field boundary, especially at NE. A rectangular annexe (ME039-009003-) was attached to the E, but it is a feature dating to the high medieval period. Subsequently, archaeological testing (21E0190) by Y. Whitty (2021) c. 130m to the SE produced no related material (excavations.ie 2021:038). (Clutterbuck 2009, vol. 1, 26-9) See the attached plans from Clutterbuck (2009, vol. 1, figs 15, 17) _2 Annotated site plan; _3 Rath plan; Compiled by: Michael Moore Date of upload: 5 May 2020

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