What is recorded here

Merrywell 1 is a straight-sided well in Knockmark parish, County Meath, whose blue-grey fill preserved waterlogged seeds, animal bones and a wooden bowl before the M3 motorway cut through the slope. The hazel beneath the pottery dates to 657-862 cal. AD, suggesting people drank, discarded or buried ordinary life there long before medieval ditches and post-medieval gullies marked the land around it.

Situated on a slight S-facing slope. Archaeological centre-line testing (04E0483) by T. O’Neill of Testing Area 21, Contract 1, prior to the construction of the M3 motorway and associated works (excavations.ie: 2004:1228) identified archaeological material, which was subsequently excavated (E003051) by A. O’Connell as Merrywell 1 in Knockmark parish between August and October 2005 (excavations.ie 2005:AD13). A medieval field system (ME044-068002-) defined by boundary ditches and gullies is associated with this well, but a prehistoric charcoal-making pit (ME044-068003-) is also within the excavated area. The well (diam. c. 2.15m; D 1.5m) is straight-sided and flat-bottomed, and had two principal fills. The primary fill, a blue-grey silty clay, contained animal bones together with the waterlogged seeds of a wide range of brambles and weeds indicative of a mixed deciduous woodland with scrub. There were also insect and mollusc remains together with bird bones. Wooden dowels, a wooden lathe-turned bowl, and medieval pottery sherds of Dublin-type coarseware were in the basal layer, but the pottery must be intrusive as a sample of hazel from this fill produced a C14 date of 657-862 cal. AD. This was below a similar layer (T 0.65m) with rounded stones and some charcoal flecks that contained similar pottery but also had a wooden yoke. The layer above this (T 0.72m) is a grey silty clay with stones which spills into a boundary ditch (Wth c. 2.6m; D c. 1.2m) that extends off to the SE, accompanied by a slighter, post-medieval gully (Wth 1.65m; D 0.38m) 3m to the SW. Further S a similar post-medieval gully diverges from the medieval ditch on the E side, the gap widening as it proceeds S. (O'Connell and Ginn 2009) Compiled by: Michael Moore Date of upload: 10 December 2021 O’Connell & V. Ginn 2009 M3 Clonee - North of Kells, Contract 1 Clonee – Dunshaughlin. Final Report on the Archaeological Excavation of Merrywell 1, Co. Meath. Licence: E003051. Unpublished report, Archaeological Consultancy Services O’Neill, T. 2004 M3 Clonee – North of Kells, Contract 1, Report on Archaeological Assessment at Testing Area 21, Merrywell, County Meath. Licence: 04E0483. Unpublished report, Archaeological Consultancy Services

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