Amiual Meeting. 119 



site, comprising flooring tiles, roofing tiles and roofing slates from 

 the old Abbey. With these were mixed bones and horns of 

 domestic animals, including boars, deer and fowl, with broken 

 pottery of the ordinary domestic, apparently mediaeval, type. 



As the trench proceeded further away from the lane, the 

 Abbey debris seemed to stop ; the soil was everywhere permeated 

 with soot and decayed vegetable matter, and very black ; the 

 depth of the black soil varied from about three feet to, at places, 

 five or six feet or more, resting on the gr;ivel subsoil in the 

 neighbourhood. About 40 feet from the lane the trench cut 

 through what appeared to be superimposed hearths showing two 

 layers of soot or fire remains. These were traced laterally for a 

 few feet, exposing fragments of pottery cooking vessels and 

 several pieces of broken quern stones. The pottery of which 

 specimens are shown is of the crude hand-made class to which I 

 have applied the name '' souterrain type " ; it is the class of 

 which about 90 per cent, of the souterrain pottery consists, and 

 dates probably between the 4th and 8th centuries. One or two 

 fragments of early wheel-turned pottery were also found in the 

 black soil, but not in the hearth sites ; these I believe to be of 

 8th to 10th century. Among the other interesting items found 

 were two remarkable stones : one is a quartz nodule perforated 

 by five circular polished holes ; of its use I can form no con- 

 jecture. The other is an artificially rounded stone of about 2" 

 diameter. This is one of the hurling stones used by the Irish in 

 warfare in the 12th century in place of the bow and arrow. Of 

 these stones Griraldus Cambrensis says : " Handstones (Lapides 

 pugillares), when other weapons fail, they hurl more dexterously 

 than any other nation, so as to inflict great loss on their enemies." 

 O'Curry, in his "Manners and Customs " (Yol. ii., p. 263), says 

 that the Irish of this period retained these stones in the hollow 

 of their shields for use when required. 



The experimental excavation of the trenches |ust referred to 

 was made in the latter half of October ; the weather was broken 

 and the days getting very short, so we deemed it wiser to dis- 



