Burial mound in Castletown

In 2010, during archaeological monitoring (Excavation Licence No. 10E0414) of ongoing restoration works commissioned by the Office of Public Works within Castletown Demesne, a prehistoric site was uncovered in a trench for a gas pipeline and services ducting traversing the front lawn of the Castletown House. An area measuring approximately 8m by 9m was opened in order to clarify the nature and context of the find. The site contained a crouched inhumation burial and a crushed prehistoric vessel which were fully recorded and removed (designated KD011-060001-). The burial appears to fit with the 'Bowl Tradition' of Bronze Age burial of the later 3rd Millennium BC. The service trench had truncated six other pit burials (designated KD011-060002-, KD011-060003-, KD011-060004-, KD011-060005-, KD011-060006- and KD011-060007-). They were recorded in situ and were not subjected to any further disturbance. The pits were sub-circular (diams. 1-2m: D 0.3-0.6m), and, visible in section, filled with quantities of cremated bone. Their morphologies and fills have a similar character to the crouched inhumation. Four sherds of prehistoric pottery were also found. Provisional conclusions are that the site represents a cemetery of pit burials. A circular concentration of compact stony material (diam. 3m) to the north-east of the excavated burial may be the surviving core of a low mound, otherwise levelled (KD011-060-----). Significantly two of the smaller pits (diam. 1m) are set into the edges of this stony material, with three of the larger pits (diam 2m), including the pit containing the excavated burial, lying its edge (L 0.5-2.5m away). The burial pattern appears to be the insertion of cremations into a small focal mound with inhumations situated around its edges. Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy Date of upload: 10 June 2011