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AR01055_EMAP_Gazetteer_of_Sites_4-2_10.pdf - The Heritage ...

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Antrim<br />

Lissue, Co. Antrim<br />

Early Medieval Settlement Enclosure.<br />

Grid Ref: J22786325 (32278/36325)<br />

SMR No. ANT 067:013<br />

Excavation Licence: N/A<br />

Excavation Duration/Year: June – August 1946.<br />

Site Director: G. Bersu (Royal Irish Academy).<br />

<strong>The</strong> site consists <strong>of</strong> a univallate enclosure, approximately 60m in diameter, built on the<br />

southern slope <strong>of</strong> a drumlin. A research excavation was undertaken combining the Royal Irish<br />

Academy; Queen’s University, Belfast; the Belfast Municipal Museum; and the Inspectorate <strong>of</strong><br />

Ancient Monuments.<br />

Excavation revealed the presence <strong>of</strong> an earlier, smaller enclosure ditch (Fig. 33). Finds from<br />

the fill <strong>of</strong> this earlier ditch included animal bones and pieces <strong>of</strong> worked wood, along with<br />

sherds <strong>of</strong> souterrain ware, which suggest that this ditch was deliberately back-filled during<br />

the early medieval period, when the enclosure expanded to its present size.<br />

A large number <strong>of</strong> postholes were uncovered in the interior <strong>of</strong> the enclosure. <strong>The</strong>se were<br />

interpreted by the excavator as forming concentric circles, and, based on previous<br />

excavations in the Isle <strong>of</strong> Man, the excavator suggested that these represented a circular<br />

structure, approximately 40m in diameter, which would have covered the entire interior <strong>of</strong><br />

the enclosure. No other such structure has been identified in an Irish context, and it is<br />

possible that such an interpretation is erroneous.<br />

Finds from the site included a slate ‘trial-piece’ which has examples <strong>of</strong> interlaced design; a<br />

bronze ring-pin; and two glass beads. <strong>The</strong>re were also vast amounts <strong>of</strong> souterrain ware – the<br />

sherds from the earlier ditch tended to be undecorated, whereas those from the later<br />

enclosure had ‘cable-ornamentation’, presumably formed by pinching the clay between finger<br />

and thumb. <strong>The</strong> water-logged conditions in the ditch <strong>of</strong> the later enclosure preserved wooden<br />

artefacts (including most <strong>of</strong> an oaken churn, and a couple <strong>of</strong> lathe-turned vessels – all <strong>of</strong><br />

which were typologically dated to around the start <strong>of</strong> the ninth century), and the fragments<br />

<strong>of</strong> two (or three) leather shoes.<br />

58

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