- Mooghaun & Hillforts
The hillfort at Mooghaun South is a large monument, enclosed by three ramparts of limestone rubble, defining an area of about 12 hectares (27 acres). The ramparts are up to 12m wide and survive to a maximum height of 2m. Excavation was carried out in selected parts of the hillfort. This has provided evidence for settlement during the Late Bronze Age after its construction around 1260-930 BC. There are extensive layers of occupation debris but evidence for structures was limited to two small circular houses. Its function may have been that of a great tribal stronghold of high status but one that was not permanently inhabited by large numbers of people.
Mooghaun appears to form the focal site of an important sub-regional territory in south-east Clare. Some 25 other hillforts have been identified in the course of this research within North Munster and of these Ballylin, Co. Limerick, Fermoyle, Co. Clare, Knockadigeen and Laghtea, Co. Tipperary seem, from their commanding locations, their size (all are over 7ha [17 acres]), and the nature and strength of their defences, to represent similar high status centres. The remaining hillforts are less than half the size of the more prominent ones and may form lesser sites within a settlement hierarchy.As part of the settlement studies a number of fortified hilltop enclosures were also identified. Like the hillforts these concentrate in the core of the Late Bronze Age focus of the North Munster province. Their occupants might have belonged to a lower social rank than those of the hillforts. To test this hypothesis one such earthwork was investigated. The site at Clenagh, about 93m by 75m, consists of a ditch with an inner and outer bank. Evidence for occupation and possibly funerary activity was revealed but considerable damage had been caused in the interior by later agricultural activity. While further dating is awaited the site had been long abandoned by the end of the fourth century AD.
Smaller Habitation Sites
Smaller enclosed habitation sites, less than 500m2 in area, have been identified throughout the study area. Examples at Lough Gur and Aughinish within North Munster have yielded evidence for Late Bronze Age occupation and the sites seem to cluster within areas of intensive settlement of the period. Other sites within these Late Bronze Age concentrations include barrows, standing stones, and fulachta fiadh. It is also evident that while the artefacts tend also to cluster in these areas, the distribution of objects is wider than that of the more distinctive monuments. This pattern of close association between the various settlement and ceremonial or ritual sites is repeated within the major cores areas of activity, principally at Mooghaun, Ballylin, Knocklong and Lough Gur in Co. Limerick, Cullen and Knockadigeen, Co. Tipperary, and the Cashen estuary in Co. Kerry. Each of these areas has a distinctive character in terms of the patterning of this evidence although the artefacts, and especially the high status ornaments, provide a unifying factor within the region as a whole. Aspects of the artefactual record, the gold ornaments for instance, may provide information that will help to evaluate the social context of production, use and deposition.
During the Late Bronze Age the importance of the Mooghaun area increased. The distribution of sites, monuments and artefacts is concentrated within an area of about 176km2 characterised by low hills, small lakes, and raised bog. Surprisingly this lakeland zone consists mainly of land considered marginal in modern agriculture. However, it appears that during later prehistory a more varied and flexible economy emerged; this may have extended to control over agricultural resources at some distance from the focus of important settlements. This may have meant that some farmland owned or controlled by the elite occurred outside the area in which they lived. Part of the assessment of the wider landscape utilisation included an inter-tidal survey of the Shannon-Fergus estuary (see separate boards) a new type of archaeological survey for Ireland. The main purpose of the investigations was to access the possible survival of later prehistoric material in the estuarine wetland. A very considerable body of evidence, spanning the whole period of human activity in the region, was identified, including Middle Bronze Age huts sites, a Late Bronze Age trackway or boat jetty, and what is to date Ireland's oldest boat, a canoe nearly 7,000 years old.
The final reports were published in 2005 (see publications)