EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Meath
Lagore (Lagore Big td.), Co. Meath
Early Medieval Crannog
Grid reference: N98615284 (298619/252846)
SMR No: ME038-027
Excavation License No: N/A
Excavation duration/Year: 1934; 1935; 1936.
Site director: H. O’N. Hencken (Harvard Archaeological Expedition)
Lagore crannog, Co. Meath, was first discovered in 1839, when local labourers digging a
drainage ditch exposed wooden structures, huge amounts of animal bone and numerous
finds of metalwork at the site. The subsequent antiquarian investigations at Lagore can safely
be considered to mark the beginnings of research on Irish crannogs. The site was later
excavated by the Harvard Archaeological Expedition between 1934 and 1936. The
stratigraphy of the crannog was complex and badly obscured by the earlier diggings, so that
its dating and structures have been the subject of much re-interpretation.
The crannog survived as a large mound measuring 41m across, consisting of 3m thickness of
peat, brushwood and timber, located at the eastern end of a now drained lake (Fig. 242).
Lagore crannog was occupied between the seventh and early eleventh centuries A.D. and
historical sources have traditionally been used to identify it as the actual historical site Loch
Gabor, the early medieval residence of the kings of Brega of the southern Uí Néill.
Archaeologists have in the past attempted to put the date of the start of Lagore back before
the fifth century A.D., but most recent commentators have accepted the seventh-century
origins for the site.
Lagore crannog was certainly occupied over a long period, re-constructed and re-built on
several occasions. There is good evidence for some late Bronze Age activity on the site,
although this is difficult to clarify. Hencken, strongly influenced by the constraints of the
historical references, identified three separate, chronological, consecutive palisades of firstly
piles, then posts and finally planks. Lynn has suggested there were even more phases of
occupation. The palisades probably defined the outer defences of the crannog.
Hencken suggested that the crannog builders firstly placed a layer of animal bone,
brushwood and peat on the lakebed, to use as a foundation to work from in building the main
crannog. This layer he designated as his Period 1a, which he considered, preceded the use of
the crannog proper. Lynn has suggested that the Period 1a material is itself evidence of a
lake settlement, rather than the debris and working platform of crannog builders. This
occupation phase, compacted and driven into the lake muds by the weight of the later
crannog, may have had houses, hearths, piles, wooden platforms, brushwood and wattle
mats and occupation debris. This earliest phase of occupation produced some Roman pottery
(including Terra Sigilata) and post-Roman material. The latter included seventh-century
pottery, an iron sword, a seventh-century gold ornament and a seventh to eighth-century
horse bit. Period Ib was taken by Hencken to represent the first main phase of occupation,
but it probably was just one of several successive phases after the first occupation. Period 1b
produced Romano-British pottery, evidence for a seventh to eighth century work-shop for
making glass studs and a seventh-eighth century bronze disc.
Liam Price’s historical research was to strongly influence Hencken’s interpretations of the
chronology of the site. He believed that historical references to the destruction of the crannog
could be identified in the archaeological record. He thought that the Period I occupation was
abandoned after the event referred to in the Annals of Ulster for A.D. 850, when Cinaed son
of Conaing, King of Cianancht rebelled against Mael Sechnaill, plundered the Uí Néill and
‘deceitfully sacked the island of Loch Gabor, levelling it to the ground’ (corro ort innsi Locha
Gabur dolose corbo comardd fria lar), while also burning the nearby church of Treóit. Period
II and Period III produced few finds to enable close dating of the site. Hencken felt that the
Period II occupation probably ended with the destruction by Lagore described by the Annals
of Ulster for A.D. 934 when ‘the island of Loch Gabor was sacked by Amlaíb, grandson of
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