What is recorded here

Half a metre of soil and a ring of river stones contained a whole life: a slabbed hearth, two pits heavy with flint, and a southern gap for coming and going. People stood at that entrance, struck flakes until their thumbs ached, dropped the worst into the pits, and left the rest scattered like spilled teeth. The chamber was small enough to know by heart, yet it belonged to a crowded hillside where the dead and living shared one breath. Modern excavation opened the chamber in 1962, but the hands that built it had already measured the world in fire, stone, distance and memory.

Situated on the S slopes of Piperstown Hill. A habitation site known as Site M. Excavated in 1962 it was found to consist of an irregular single-course ring of small and large rounded stones which delimited an area more sub-rectangular than oval, and which measured c. 5.5m north – south by 4m east – west, with an entrance at the south. A hearth was revealed slightly north of centre of the enclosure (0.95m by 0.65m) with each side formed of a single slab. Immediately east of the hearth was a circular pit (Pit 1; 1.4m diam.; 0.40m deep) which had been filled with large stones and contained a quantity of worked flint flakes and artifacts. To the south of this pit was a second one (Pit 2; 1.50m by 1.10m and 0.30m deep) located just inside the entrance feature. This also was filled with large stones and several struck flints and a few artifacts were recovered from it. The area around the entrance produced large quantities of flints, mostly waste flakes. (Rynne and Ó hEailidhe 1965, 71-5). This is part of an extensive settlement and cemetery of Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age date. Compiled by: Paul Walsh and Padraig Clancy Revised upload on: 8 July 2018

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