What is recorded here

Marianne and I walked north of Doonpower at low tide, lifting flint fragments from soil that ploughs erase each spring. We were not discovering a palace; we were collecting what cultivation keeps destroying. Under our feet lay the best Later Mesolithic concentration on this coastline, reduced to scattered knives and broken arrows. We took pictures, skipped stones across the shallows, and came home carrying small sharp proofs that people lived here before memory began.

Just N of Doonpower promontory fort (CO100-01702-). Noted during field-walking by Cork Archaeological Survey. "Late Mesolithic site, mostly destroyed due to cultivation. Best concentration of flint on this coastline of the Later Mesolithic" (pers. comm. Prof. P. Woodman, U.C.C.). The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Cork. Volume 2: East and South Cork' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1994). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. Date of upload/revision: 14 January 2009

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