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EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

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Meath<br />

spindle whorls, loom beater pins, a weaver’s rubbing stone and a loom weight were<br />

recovered from some of the enclosing ditch fills.<br />

Small-scale ironworking was evident by the presence of three possible bowl furnaces, a<br />

charcoal production pit and the occurrence of iron waste or slag. One of the bowl furnaces<br />

was dated to A.D. 564-666 while the charcoal production pit was formed later between A.D.<br />

1035-1225. Evidence for non-ferrous metalworking was also small and included two rough<br />

globules of molten copper and a possible copper ingot.<br />

Cereal processing was evident in the form of a figure-of-eight-shaped cereal-drying kiln and<br />

the fragments of two rotary quern-stones. Charcoal from the second fill of the kin was dated<br />

to A.D. 662-828.<br />

Three hundred and thirty seven wooden pieces were identified at Castlefarm and they all<br />

belonged to the early medieval phases. <strong>The</strong> most prevalent species were alder and hazel,<br />

followed by pomaceous fruitwood and ash. Seven components of stave-built wooden vessels<br />

were included in the assemblage and the presence of the blade from a cooper’s croze – which<br />

was a specialist woodworking tool – strongly suggests that stave-built wooden vessels were<br />

manufactured at Castlefarm.<br />

461

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