What is recorded here

Four cremation pits sat hidden in Castletroy pasture until housing work exposed them in 2003. They contained burnt bone, charcoal and occasional pottery, preserving a ceremony that no map or marker recorded. The dead were reduced to embers, placed in shallow oval or circular holes, and buried beneath grass that later grazed sheep. Forgetfulness did not erase the act of love; it only removed the warning that the ground had been touched.

On a gentle SSW-facing slope, in pasture, on the N side of Schoolhouse Road, Castletroy. Not depicted on OS historic mapping. Identified by Flor Hurley in 2003 during monitoring (License No. 03E1382) for a housing scheme known as Glantan and excavated (License No. 03E1717) by Niamh O’Callaghan later in 2003. Area 6 (50m to S of Area 1) contained four cremation pits which were situated c. 15m to NE of miscellaneous excavation (LI005-088003-). These were similar in size and form to those excavated in Areas 1 and 2. They all contained fragments of cremated bone and a small number of pottery sherds were recorded in two examples. Two of the cremation pits were oval-shaped and two were circular-shaped and all contained charcoal and burnt bone within the deposits (Hurley 2003, 9-10). See attached plan extract from monitoring report (Hurley 2003). Compiled by: Alison McQueen and Vera Rahilly Date of upload: 30 June 2020

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