Iron Age Ireland (Archaeology)

The Later Prehistoric Finds Group (LPFG) is open to anyone interested in the material culture of the Bronze and Iron Age. Our aim is to promote the study of later prehistoric artefacts, showcasing new finds and research and promoting the discussion of related topics. We are now seeking contributions for our summer newsletter. Contributors are invited to submit short articles (a maximum of 1,000 words, excluding bibliography) with no more than four images. Articles can focus on: • New discoveries • Original research • Reviews of conferences or books Details of how to reference and format bibliographies can be found here. We also welcome contributions in the form of datasheets which discuss specific artefact types. These are not included in our newsletter, but are made available on our website for consultation. For more information, or to submit an article for the next issue of the LPFG newsletter, please contact lpfgnews@outlook.com. Please note that the deadline for submissions is the 14 th June. If you are not already a member of the LPFG, feel free to check out our Membership page to ensure you are kept aware of the latest developments in later prehistoric material culture research.

This is a my M.Phil thesis from 1992 undertaken under the supervision of John Moreland in the Department of Prehistory and Archaeoogy at the University of Sheffield. It represents work undertaken in 1990 and '91. 
Like most such items of juvenilia there is much here that is  immature but some good ideas lurk in its pages none the less.

Spanish, French, German and British academics and researchers will participate in the First International conference: “Iron Age Peoples of the Cantabric Iron Age”, to be held in Santander to deepen the historical knowledge of the north of the Iberian Peninsula, its inhabitants and their ties with the Celtic cultures of the European Atlantic façade, between late Prehistory and the High Middle Ages.

The conference will take place in Santander (Cantabria, Spain) on May 24 and 25, and will end in Aguilar de Campoo (Palencia, Spain) on May 26 with a visit to the archaeological site of Monte Bernorio and a recital by the renowned Scottish musician John Kenny, who will play musical instruments which are replicas of ancient Celtic instruments discovered in archaeological sites from the Celtic world of the Iron Age.

This International conference has been organized by the Monte Bernorio Institute of Studies of the Antiquity of the Cantabrian (IMBEAC) and it is directed by Dr. Jesús F. Torres-Martínez, PhD in archaeology and a specialist in the Iron Age of the north of the Iberian Peninsula.

The importance of what we might call as Celtic mare nostrum will be studied throughout the congress. The Celtic sea was a crucial factor that facilitated the contacts between the peoples of the Cantabrian and the rest of the European Celtic world. The elements of the Celtic past that have survived in our time will also be analyzed.

The presentations will deal with many aspects of everyday life in the Cantabrian area in the Iron Age: culture, language, war, music, travels, the contacts with Celtic European peoples, and the struggle against Rome. We will also analyse how the Celtic sea became a bridge in the “bright” season allowing Celtic peoples living around it to meet. The speakers will also study the survival of many Celtic elements of the Iron Age in our current life, such as toponymy, land planning, elements of folklore, and several popular rites as well as some features of Christian religiosity.

The three-day conference will be held in Santander and in Aguilar de Campoo; the first two days, May 24 and 25, will take place at the CASYC (Social and Cultural Action Centre of Caja Cantabria) headquarters in Santander. The third day will take place in Aguilar de Campoo, and it will consist of a visit to the emblematic archaeological site of Monte Bernorio, one of the most important Iron Age sites in Europe. Later Miss Raquel Jiménez Pasalodos will make a presentation on archaeomusic, and finally the famous Scottish musician and composer John Kenny, who is a specialist in ancient musical instruments, will give a recital at the Theatre Amor Auditorium.

X Coloquio de la Asociación Interdisciplinar de Estudios Romanos (AIER) - Formas de morir y formas de matar en la antigüedad romana. Madrid, 28-30/XI/2012: El druida era un personaje clave de la sociedad celta. Según el arquetipo, su poder trascendía lo puramente religioso y mágico hasta alcanzar el plano de la política, la propaganda (también política) y la jurisprudencia; sin embargo, su papel en la guerra (con todas las implicaciones rituales y religiosas que posee) en todos los sentidos resulta menos conocido. Como miembros de la aristocracia local y/o étnica, los druidas son representados en los mitos y leyendas celtas reuniendo y capitaneando sus propias huestes, armándose para el combate e interviniendo en el mismo. Las fuentes greco-romanas, aunque menos explícitas en esta materia (y a veces contradictorias), aportan también una valiosa perspectiva desde otra mentalidad y otro lado del campo de batalla. Pero, más allá de la constatación o no de la participación de los druidas en la guerra, falta comprender un aspecto esencial: ¿De qué forma se esperaba que un druida matase en combate? ¿De qué forma un druida podía ser abatido en la batalla? Si tenemos en cuenta que, desde el punto de vista de las mentalidades antiguas, las prácticas mágicas formaban parte de las funciones esenciales de los druidas, la pregunta cobra un mayor sentido: ¿Se esperaba que un druida empleara la magia y la intervención divina como arma para matar, o debía limitarse a emplear medios prosaicos y comunes al resto de los guerreros? ¿Podía morir un druida a espada, o debía hacerlo mediante medios concretos, quizás mágicos o divinos? Estas preguntas ayudan a comprender si el druida celta seguía siendo considerado como tal al intervenir en el combate o si, por el contrario, debía despojarse temporalmente de su carácter sagrado y mágico (regresando a su condición de aristócrata armado) para poder empuñar la espada.

A small tubular fragment made of gold was found in Newgrange in 1862 near the alleged site of the late Iron Age shrine. The site produced many valuable finds, including gold Roman coins, gold and silver ornaments and hacked gold pieces. Although the analysed object has been regarded as a part of an ornament, no parallel example has been indicated so far. In author’s opinion, it is a fragment of a late Roman bracelet. Only few examples of this type of ornament have been recorded so far and the Newgrange piece would be the first one found outside the Roman Empire. The object arrived to Ireland in the last quarter of the 4th century AD, probably in the same wave as the Conyngham hoard and four late Roman solidi issued between 367 and 387 AD.

As iron technology arose alongside and in many contexts replaced bronze production, the conception of what it meant to be a smith was rooted in the performance and social action involved in the production of iron objects.  The development of iron technology in Ireland was a slow process, where meaning was enacted through the practices of the smith who may have travelled across the landscape from community to community. What it meant to be a smith necessitated both periodic innovation and the maintenance of expectations of competency, as systems of practice implicated in the technology were assessed by the consumers' perception. During the production of iron objects, the smith enacted performative traditions and imagined futures.  The performances, saturated with symbolic associations, provided an occasion for multi-temporal meaning-making. The assembling of smith identity was produced concomitantly by the imaginations of his audience, the expectations of those consuming the products, and the choices of the smith himself. This chapter will provide a brief discussion of how we may conceive of the making of identity through a constant assembling of social engagements with performance, mobility, and temporality, specifically as it would have occurred for the itinerant smith, and present a possible case for the assembling of this identity in Iron Age Ireland.

Cet article présente le Knocknarea Archaeological Project dont l'objectif est d'étudier les relations entre les peuples du Néolithique et la montagne Knocknarea comme instrument de pouvoir rituel. Les différents sites enregistrés au cours des fouilles ont effcetivement prouvé l' ...

EXTENDED CALL FOR PAPERS - 19th OF MAY

The University of Bradford is proud to host the 20th Iron Age Student Research Symposium (IARSS). The symposium will be held between the 31st of May and the 2nd of June, with papers, posters and presentations, followed by a guided visit to the Hull Museum on the 3rd of June.
IARSS is a research student focused conference, providing an opportunity for students to share their work, network and collaborate with others. This event is open for contributions from postgraduate research students and new researchers, however, Master students are also welcome to submit and participate in the conference. Although IARSS is promoted as an Iron Age conference, contributions from colleagues studying or working within related periods, such as the Late Bronze Age and Roman Iron Age are also welcome. IARSS has traditionally focused on Iron Age Britain, however we welcome contributions from those colleagues examining the Iron Age elsewhere in the world, including, but not limited to, Ireland, the European continent and the Near East.

For colleagues interested in participating, please submit an abstract between c.250-300 words and 5 keywords related to your research. Presentations should be 15-20 minutes long and in English. Posters may be bilingual but they must be understandable to English speakers and an abstract in English must be provided.

Abstracts should be sent to:
iarss2017@gmail.com until the 19th of May.

Excavations at Cookstown were carried out in advance of the N2 Finglas-Ashbourne road scheme on behalf of Meath County Council. The site was located 1km west of Ashbourne town. The site was initially identified during a geophysical survey in 2002. Test excavations in 2003 confirmed the site’s archaeological significance. The excavation, directed by the author, was carried out by a team of between 24 and 51 archaeologists between 15 January and 31 May 2004. The 1.1 ha site, which was divided into four areas, contained material and features from the Bronze Age, Iron Age, early medieval, high medieval and modern periods. The majority of the features date from the medieval period and the site can be primarily characterised as a medieval settlement site. This report details the results of the excavation, including specialist analysis and interpretation.
This section of Volume 3 contains the artefact illustrations by Malgorzata Kryczka and artefact photographs by John Sunderland and Richard Clutterbuck.

Excavations at Cookstown were carried out in advance of the N2 Finglas-Ashbourne road scheme on behalf of Meath County Council. The site was located 1km west of Ashbourne town. The site was initially identified during a geophysical survey in 2002. Test excavations in 2003 confirmed the site’s archaeological significance. The excavation, directed by the author, was carried out by a team of between 24 and 51 archaeologists between 15 January and 31 May 2004. The 1.1 ha site, which was divided into four areas, contained material and features from the Bronze Age, Iron Age, early medieval, high medieval and modern periods. The majority of the features date from the medieval period and the site can be primarily characterised as a medieval settlement site. This report details the results of the excavation, including specialist analysis and interpretation.
Volume three contains the results of the specialist analysis, including the radiocarbon dates from Waikato University (Appendix 6), the prehistoric pottery by Helen Roche and Eoin Grogan (Appendix 7), medieval pottery by Clare McCutcheon (Appendix 8), the post-medieval pottery report by Rosanne Meenan (Appendix 9), including a catalogue of post medieval pottery by Gordana Baljkis; a lithics report by Dermot Moore (Appendix 10) and small finds reports for glass (Appendix 11), clay pipe (Appendix 12), metal objects (Appendix 13), bone and ivory (Appendix 14) by Milica Rajic. The single human burial discovered in Cookstown Site 25 is detailed in a report by Linda Fibiger (Appendix 15). Both Dr Emily Murray and Linda Fibiger analysed the burnt bone from the site (Appendix 16), whilst the results of the analysis of animal bone assemblage is detailed in a report by Dr Emily Murray (Appendix 17). The wood and charcoal identification are detailed in a report by Ellen O’Carroll (Appendix 18), and the plant-macro remains are detailed in a report by Susan Lyons (Appendix 19). The results of an examination and analysis of the industrial waste from the site, and specifically from the forge, are detailed in a report by Dr Effie Photos-Jones (Appendix 20).

Excavations at Cookstown were carried out in advance of the N2 Finglas-Ashbourne road scheme on behalf of Meath County Council. The site was located 1km west of Ashbourne town. The site was initially identified during a geophysical survey in 2002. Test excavations in 2003 confirmed the site’s archaeological significance. The excavation, directed by the author, was carried out by a team of between 24 and 51 archaeologists between 15 January and 31 May 2004. The 1.1 ha site, which was divided into four areas, contained material and features from the Bronze Age, Iron Age, early medieval, high medieval and modern periods. The majority of the features date from the medieval period and the site can be primarily characterised as a medieval settlement site. This report details the results of the excavation, including specialist analysis and interpretation.
Volume two contains the lists of archaeological sites (Appendix 1) and finds and previous excavations (Volume 2 & 3) from the environs of Cookstown. Volume two also contains the feature register (Appendix 4) and finds register (Appendix 5).