Mound in Clowanstown (skreen By., Skreen Ed.)

Located in a fairly level landscape at the W edge of what was probably a small lake (dims c. 1.5km NW-SE; c. 0.75m NE-SW) which is described as the ‘Logh and bog of Shrereene’ on the Down Survey (1656-8) barony map and as a ‘Marl Bed’ (max. dims c. 0.5km E-W; c 0.4km N-S) on the 1836 edition of the OS 6-inch map. The original lake was probably coterminous with Commons (Skreen by.) townland. Archaeological testing (04E0418) by J. Dempsey of Testing Area 4, Contract 2, prior to the construction of the M3 motorway identified four upstanding mounds of organic material and marl. Mound A (dims 10.05m N-S; 4.8m E-W; max. H 0.58m) was 2m ENE of Mound B (dims 6.7m x 4.7m; max. H 0.12m). Mound C (dims 4.5m x 4.1m; max. H 0.2m) was 5.6m SE of A while D (dims 1.3m x 1.05m; H 0.15m) was just 2m N of A (Dempsey 2004, 12-13). The area was fully excavated (E003064) by M. Mossop (Mossop M. and Mossop E. 2009) as Clowanstown 1 (excavations.ie 2006:1533) between September and December 2006 when it proved to be a complex area with a Mesolithic post-row structure and stone platform that had four associated fish-traps, together with four Neolithic mounds and excavated features. This mound was in the same hollow as Mound A. It consisted of a primary deposit (dims 0.96m x 0.65m; T 0.17m) of marl with one pottery sherd, and the deposit had been wrapped in tree-bark (alder) that produced a C14 date of 3960-3710 cal. BC (BETA 246998). Nineteen further layers of marl mixed with calcined bone and occasional charcoal flecks and animal bones, mostly jawbones or skulls, were identified. A small amount of flint and pottery was found throughout, but two layers of burnt stone and charcoal within the mix were more productive of artefacts including pottery, a leaf-shaped arrowhead, and a bone awl. These layers also produced a large quantity of burnt bone. The mound was sealed with the consolidation layers that also sealed Mound E. The consolidation layer contained a lot of Mesolithic / Neolithic artefacts including two polished stone pendants and a dolerite adze. An animal bone from the consolidation layer produced a C14 date of 3650-3520 cal. BC (BETA 246989), and in total the mound produced 23 pottery sherds from at least eight vessels with some sherds matching across layers. (Mossop and Mossop 2009, 27-9) See the attached plans from Dempsey (2004, fig. 5) and Mossop and Mossop (fig. 16) _1 Plan of the visible mounds; _2 Plan of the consolidation layer; Compiled by: Michael Moore Date of upload: 19 April 2022