Midden in Capnagower

Situated on a low cliff on the shoreline c. 260m NNW of the island’s harbour. The branch road to the island’s hotel lies c. 10m inland from the cliff edge. The ground between it and the cliff is relatively level and grassy. Faint traces of old cultivation ridges are visible and one small tillage plot is currently being worked. The midden is briefly mentioned by Westropp (1911, 17, 28) but is not accurately located or described. It is exposed in a low vertical cliff face at the northern end of the beach at the point where the sand begins to give way to a more rocky foreshore. Occupation debris in the form of seashells, charcoal fragments and the occasional sherds of modern pottery are traceable for a distance of c. 20m northwards from the beginning of the cliff face. The exposed section face is composed of sand and boulder clay that is being gradually eroded by the combined action of wind, rainwater and the winter seas. A detailed examination of the layers exposed in the cliff face was made at a point just S of the aforementioned tillage plot. Four layers were noted in the exposed section face as follows: the depths given are relative ones below the ground surface on top of cliff. Layer A: (D 0.1m) Dark brown sod and topsoil. Layer B: (D 0.5m) Mid-brown coloured sand with numerous small stones (L <0.5m), seashells (mainly winkle and limpet) and some charcoal fragments. A number of sherds of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century pottery were noted in this layer along with a heavily encrusted iron (?)nail. Layer C: (D 0.3m) Orange-brown coloured sand with little or no stone or shell but some fish bone fragments. At time of visit, a barbed and tanged arrowhead of chert (see below) was found on a very narrow shelf-like feature at the interface of this layer and Layer D. Layer D: (D c. 1.2m) Pale yellow glacial till (‘boulder clay’) that contains a number of large stones and boulders. The ‘shelf-like feature’ noted in the description of Layer C above may well be the result of differential erosion between the softer material of Layer C and the more weather-resistant Layer D. Consequently, the arrowhead may have been in a secondary rather than a primary position when found. As it survives the arrowhead is a diminutive artefact, roughly triangular in shape (L 13mm, L 15mm max.). It is only 3mm in maximum thickness at centre, tapering to sharp edges at the point and along the sides. Both faces of the arrowhead bear clear traces of pressure flaking. It originally had a tang and two flanking barbs at its base, but these were already broken off when found. However, the notches indicating the positions of both barbs survive. These indicate that the tang was 6mm wide, while the barbs appear to have been in the region of 2mm wide. The rock type is a black chert that has a thread-like, whitish ‘vein’ running through it: it was identified by Dr Adrian Phillips, TCD (pers. comm.) as ‘comparable to the bedded cherts in the Ballytoohy Formation near the Lighthouse’. Now in the National Museum of Ireland, Dublin (NMI reg. no. 2006:83) (see also Corlett 2001, Fig. 5). Resistivity survey failed to detect this feature, perhaps because of a combination of faulty equipment and proximity to the sea (it is possible that a high salt content caused lower readings) (Kulessa 1993, 61). Edited by Paul Gosling, Conleth Manning and John Waddell. (Royal Irish Academy, Dublin. 2007).