EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Sligo
Knoxspark, Co. Sligo
Early Medieval Promontory Fort.
Grid Reference: G67262876 (16726/32876)
SMR No: SL020-166
Excavation Licence: 94E060
Excavation Duration/Year: May – July 1994.
Site Director: C. Mount (Heritage Council).
The site consists of an enclosure set on an elongated ridge. This area was to have been
destroyed during a road construction project. However, upon preliminary excavation of the
site, the road-take was diverted, allowing the interior of the enclosure to be excavated under
research conditions, rather than rescue conditions.
The enclosed area measured approximately 75m by 64m, defined by an arc of earthworks
consisting of two series of banks, and an intervening ditch (Fig. 261). This effectively cut off
the end of the ridge, creating an inland ‘promontory fort’ defended by a river bed and marshy
area. Two cairns excavated outside the main enclosure would appear to have been
contemporary with the in-filling of the ditch.
A smaller sub-rectangular enclosure (23m by 19m) was located within the confines of the
‘promontory fort’. It was enclosed by a stone wall that survived up to 0.95m in height.
Occupation debris from this smaller enclosure included animal bone, iron artefacts, and iron
slag. This enclosure appears to have been established as the boundaries of a cemetery site
for over 185 individuals which re-used the central area of the promontory fort. Although
cremations were discovered in the two cairns, which seem to have provided the original focal
point for this cemetery, radiocarbon dates from animal bones from the cairns suggest it was
still in use during the early medieval period (see below).
The cemetery was dominated by east-west orientated burials, suggestive of the Christian rite.
A number of the burials may have been earlier, for example a decapitation burial similar to
Iron Age example; and one burial was accompanied by a socketed iron spearhead. The
radiocarbon date from this later individual, however, placed him firmly in the eighth/ninth
century (see below).
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