Archaeological Watermarks: Settlement, Economy and Seasonal Flooding in Historical Ireland

Enda O Flaherty (Galway Doctoral Research Fellow)
Arc204, Department of Archaeology
National University of Ireland, Galway
eanna81gmail.com

Supervisor: Dr. Elizabeth FitzPatrick

Funded by the National University of Ireland College of Arts, Social Sciences and Celtic Studies Galway Doctoral Research Scholarship Scheme.

The receding turlough waters of Garryland/Doonowen Turlough, south Co. Galway revealing the rich summer grazing lands set in dense scrub-land.

Carron Turlough, Co. Clare in summer - an extensive depression situated in the glacio-karstic landscape of the Burren region.

This research is concerned with understanding past human interaction with the dynamic nature of turloughs from the medieval to the modern period in Ireland. The nature of seasonal flooding and an understanding of the archaeological, historical, toponymic and folklore evidence for its management and manipulation are central issues of this research. The knowledge that population groups and communities acquired about seasonal flooding and how that knowledge was used to manage and exploit turloughs to their own benefit is explored using a database of 304 turlough sites, and specific case studies of turlough landscapes. The primary aim of this research is to assess the dynamic nature of turloughs and to determine their direct influence on settlement in Ireland with reference to the phenomenon internationally. 

An extensive bibliography of 324 papers and publications, which was compiled by the School of Natural Sciences at Trinity College, Dublin in 2007, revealed that flood-land research on Ireland has largely concentrated on the environmental aspects of turloughs – primarily hydrology, ecology and conservation matters, and that there has been no focus as yet on the relationship between past symbiotic human settlement and turlough environments. The present project draws out the important symbiosis between physical environment and society, developing upon existing environmental research conducted on flood-lands.

The broad chronological period and diverse sources involved in this research necessitates the use of two main theoretical approaches. These include archaeological landscape theory and the theoretical models associated with historical archaeology. The basis of the former is that the cultural landscape is a product of the interaction of man with the physical landscape - a theory that is ideally suited to the study of past human settlement and turlough environments. This theoretical framework also takes due regard to the fact that this research spans the environmental sciences and the humanities. The basis of historical archaeology is that people in the past constructed their identities through an engagement with memory, texts and the material world, and this theoretical model has found ready application to the study of folklore, place-names and the identity of people in turlough landscapes.

Many forms of material culture are involved in the negotiation of identity through time including the physical landscape and space, and both are inherently linked to socially and culturally mediated remembrance, and memory of place and its significance. This research demonstrates that in areas where turloughs frequently occur, they have been incorporated into the material, social, and cognitive cultural landscapes of past human populations and communities over an extended time period, and through a multitude of cultural layers and contexts.

Central research questions

• Disclaimer
• Privacy
• Copyright
• Accessibility