The Lake Dwellings of Ireland: Or ancient lacustrine habitations of Erin, commonly called crannogs.Wood-Martin, W. G. (William Gregory)
History
The Lake Dwellings of Ireland: Or ancient lacustrine habitations of Erin, commonly called crannogs.
Wood-Martin, W. G. (William Gregory)
Lake-dwellers and lake-dwellings -- Ireland
_Kilnamaddo._--For description of this crannog, see _ante_, pp.
37-39. Amongst the “finds” were an ordinary whetstone, a couple of
hammer-stones, some flint-flakes, a large tray-like vessel composed
of oak, some fragments of rude pottery, and a pair of rubbing-stones.
Plate XLVI., figs. 5 and 9, are angle-posts of the second hut, they
measure respectively three feet eleven inches, and four feet nine
inches. Figs. 6, 7, and 8 (about one foot four inches in length), are
pegs used probably to secure the lower logs in position; these pegs
varied in size, and bore the marks of being cleanly cut by a sharp
metallic instrument.
[Illustration: Plate XLVI.
Remains, &c., found at Loughavilly, Kilnamaddo, and the Miracles.]
_The Miracles._--At a place bearing this singular name, and situated
near the village of Monea, turf-cutters in the year 1875 came upon
the remains of a hut occupying the centre of an artificial island
which stood in the middle of what had formerly been a small lake.
Unfortunately the timbers and beams with which it was constructed were
carried off before anyone skilled in archæological matters had seen
them _in situ_; but the posts represented (plate XLVI., figs. 11, 12,
and 13) were evidently angle-posts, resembling those in Kilnamaddo,
and, like them, not exhibiting the bruised appearance produced by
stone hatchets. There were pieces of iron slag, quantities of burnt
wood, a well-formed crucible, sharpening and grinding stones, a stone
or pounding instrument (_ante_, p. 74), and a beautifully-formed,
highly-polished, axe-head, and a chisel of stone. Amongst the “finds”
were numerous articles of bronze, which are now dispersed, and cannot
be traced; but from the description given of them by the workmen
they were probably fibulæ. There were also several oaken paddles,
of which one is now in the Museum, R. I. A.; the dimensions of
another were seven and a-quarter inches in length, the breadth of the
blade being three inches; the handle terminated in an oval expansion
measuring two and a-half inches across. Single-piece canoes have, from
time to time, been discovered in the neighbourhood.[213]
_Rossole Lake._--In the neighbourhood of this sheet of water (_ante_,
p. 49) there lingers a tradition of a “buried city” lying in its
depths; therefore, in the event of drainage, it is more than probable a
crannog site might be disclosed to view.
COUNTY MONAGHAN.
During the working of the Commission for the Arterial Drainage of
Ireland, six crannogs were disclosed in this county; four of these
sites have not been identified.
_Lough Fea._--A stockaded island in this lake (discovered in 1843) is
described in Shirley’s _Dominion of Farney_.
_Aghnamullen._--_Ante_, p. 135.
_Lough Ooney._--_Ante_, p. 156.
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