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Archaeological Investigations in Northern Ireland. A Summary of Recent Work

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 January 2012

Extract

The general expansion of interest in prehistoric archaeology has in recent years taken effect in Northern Ireland, where many rich fields await intensive exploration. A new phase of activity both among archaeological societies and independent workers has resulted in much promising research work. For the earliest periods held to be represented in the region Mr. C. Blake Whelan is contributing a series of papers to the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy on the results of his researches on Mesolithic questions, and several key sites were investigated in 1934 by the Harvard Archaeological Mission, working under Mr. H. L. Movius.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1935

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References

page 165 note 1 Whelan, C. Blake, ‘Studies in the Significance of the Irish Stone Age: the Campignian question’ (Proc. Roy. Irish Academy, xlii, sect. C, no. 7, 1934).Google Scholar

page 166 note 1 No less than twenty-four examples have now been identified, apart from degenerate forms with one chamber only. Others occur in the Irish Free State; in cos. Monaghan, Louth, and Sligo, and probably elsewhere. Some 500 megaliths have been listed for the six counties, and additions are constantly being made.

page 167 note 1 This term is used without prejudging the date, which may well be in the Early Metal Age.

page 168 note 1 Professor V. G. Childe has drawn attention to the alternating panels of horizontal and vertical lines on a vase from South Brittany (Archaeological Journ. lxxxviii, 54).

page 168 note 2 Piggott and Childe, Proc. P. S. E. A. vii, 62-6, fig. 3.

page 170 note 1 The site is in the townland of Ballynagross Lower, although Mr. Kelly's address is Ballyalton. Finds of this kind are fairly frequently made, but when reported to the Ancient Monuments Advisory Committee it is often too late to obtain accurate information even if the urn has escaped destruction. Very few, in consequence, have been described in any detail.

page 171 note 1 See Hencken, H. O'N. and Movius, H. L., ‘The Cemetery-cairn of Knockast’, Proc. Roy. Irish Academy, xli, sect. C, no. II, 1934.Google Scholar

page 172 note 1 Postscript: The urns are now in the Belfast Museum. They are unlike any others in the collection, and their resemblance to certain south British and west Scottish urns strengthens the probability that we have to deal with an urnfield. The discovery is likely to prove highly important for the problem of the northern Irish late Bronze Age–early Iron Age transition.