Field Trip To Woodstown Site

Almost 50 members of the public participated in a field trip organised by S.V.W.A.G. to the Woodstown Site on Saturday last. The group included enthusiasts from Waterford, Kilmeaden, Dungarvan, Kilkenny, Tipperary and Carlow. The field trip was facilitated by Mr. Richard O'Brien, a project archaeologist attached to the NRA and to Mr. Ian Russell, director of the excavations.

As the exploratory trenches crossed a modern field boundary, explained Mr. Russell, there were traces of pits, posts and fire-places every where they looked. They knew from the moment the grass and topsoil was removed, that they were looking at a densely settled and massively rich area. The existence of fireplaces in some of the trenches make it clear that people had been living there in large numbers.

Since that discovery in April 2003 the archaeologists have worked to delimit the overall extent of the site, rather than to investigate the interior. In 2004, they concentrated on a substantial series of defensive banks and ditches at the northern edge of the site. The earliest of these appear to have been cut long before the Vikings came to Ireland, around the time of St Patrick. These early ditches tended to silt up and at one stage, metalworking had taken place in the sheltered area provided by the ditch banks.

Dr Colmán Etchingham of NUI Maynooth commented: "This site is located within the territory of the Uí Fothaid, an important branch of the Déisi. It is possible that this site may have begun life as a stronghold of these local Irish chieftains."

The evidence from the limited excavations so far is that there is gap of over a hundred years between this Irish activity and a new ditch and palisade created to defend the site at the time of the early Viking invasions of Ireland. A Viking warrior was buried with his weaponry outside the entranceway and many more such burials may be discovered.

Inside the defences, work in 2004 was limited to sifting through the topsoil exposed by preliminary trenching in 2003. This very limited exercise produced over 5000 finds, meanwhile the underlying archaeology remains untouched.

S.W.W.A.G. chairman, Dr Catherine Swift commented: "It took a good deal of effort to persuade the authorities to allow this field trip but it has been a magnificent success. We are extremely grateful to Richard and Ian for giving up their Saturday to bring people around."

An article on the 2004 excavations at Woodstown will be published shortly in the journal DECIES