The Western Stone Forts Project

The Western Stone Forts Project was initiated to study a distinctive group of large stone forts located along the western seaboard of Ireland. The majority of these forts are concentrated on the Aran Islands County Galway, in the Burren Co. Clare and on the Dingle and Iveragh peninsulas Co. Kerry. Excavations associated with the project were…

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Clay mould of axehead no. 2 from Dun Aonghasa, possible valve (b), find nos. 776, 1470.

Twórca: The Discovery Programme

Identyfikator: WSFP_V03_FIG_776_1470

Typ: Image

Format: 776: L.28mm; W.28mm; T.11mm. 1470: L.49mm; W.25mm; T.11mm.

776: Small, very abraded blade fragment. The surviving part of the contact face slopes down from the matrix to the edge of the mould. There appears to have been a finer surface layer applied to the matrix but this is now very eroded. Part of outer wrap survives and lips over edge. 1470: Long narrow piece that includes part of the cutting edge and body. The contact face survives only at the cutting edge. This has a slight step and then slopes down to the edge of the mould. A thin outer wrap survives over most of the fragment, but it is possible that there was an additional layer outside this originally. The piece fits with 776 and like the latter and 853, has a three layer make-up. The presence of a step on the blade contact faces of this piece and piece 1458 makes it less likely that the two valves described here as axehead 2 are from the same mould. The other possibility is that this is the opposite valve for axehead No.3, though they are both abraded and now not a good fit.

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