Location
Okasha/Forsyth/2001, 196--197: `Derrynaflan is a virtual island, c. 30 hectares in extent, in the extensive bog of Littleton. It is mentioned as Daire na Fland, `oak-grove of the Flanns', and under its earlier name Daire Eidnech, `ivied oak-grove', in several hagiographical sources .. Situated on the border of Éile and Éogonacht ... Derrynaflan appears to have flourished between the early eighth century and the early-to-mid ninth century when it was one of the most important centres of the céli Dé reform movement ... After the death in 847 of its patron Feidlimid mac Crimthainn, King-Bishop of Cashel, the monastery appears to have declined although there are ruins of ecclesiastical buildings of possibly thirteenth-century date ... The famous hoard of ecclesiastical silver was discovered in 1980 as a result of unlicensed digging. It was concealed near the pre-Romanesque church within the monastic enclosure and had probably been buried there in the later ninth or tenth century. The objects were made at different periods through the eighth and early ninth centuries, that is, during the site's hey-day ... The standing remains at Derrynaflan include a pre-Norman single-celled church without antae ... and to the north-east a trapezoidal enclosure, open on one side. The presence of some carved medieval slabs indicate that this was a graveyard'.
Derrynaflan Hoard (from Database of Irish Excavation Reports)
Tipperary
1986:70
'Derrynaflan', Lurgoe
Monastic settlement
S108490
The 1986 season concentrated on the area surrounding the hoard findspot (Area 1 in 1985 report) and involved the re-excavation of a trench partially explored in 1980 (see M. Ryan (ed.), The Derrynaflan Hoard 1. A Preliminary Account, Dublin 1983, 52-3).
Re-excavation of the hoard pit indicated that it had been partially dug in the W edge of an oval pit, 3m x 2m, which contained sterile boulder clay. It is thus not possible to establish a terminus post quem for the deposition of the hoard.
A further stretch of the linear ditch contained imported Bii ware. It is the earliest feature on the site and its orientation is at variance with the other ditches and buildings.
Excavation in the 1986 season indicated that the field bank overlay a ditch running N-S outside the E gable of the church. The V-shaped ditch contained charcoal and animal bone, a number of bronze and iron stick pins, bone comb fragments, cut antler and a piece of sheet bronze decorated with an engraved Ringerike-style foliage pattern.
A large pit, 1.80m deep and dug into boulder clay, was back-filled with a mixture of clay and mortar. The back-till also contained a sherd of medieval pottery and the pit may be associated with one of the building phases on the site.
Raghnall O Floinn, National Museum of Ireland, Dublin
