Dungannon, Northern Ireland
First screened 2 March 2008

What they found

As if a radio communications mast interfering with the geophysics survey equipment and one-metre-thick reinforced mortar-proof army concrete that not even the biggest mechanical digger could cut a way through weren't problems enough for the archaeologists, Time Team also had to contend with the fact that the site at Dungannon had been extensively relandscaped after the defeat of Hugh O'Neill, the Earl of Tyrone, by the English here in 1602.

First, the victorious English had built their own fort on the site. Later it was laid out as luxury gardens by the new rulers from across the Irish sea. And most recently it had been used as a barracks and base for the British army during its 30-odd year stay in Northern Ireland during the 'troubles'. In the process huge quantities of material had been shifted across the site, the whole hilltop had been extended and flattened and large amounts of hardcore had been brought in as part of various building phases.

Irish tower house
The quest was to find evidence of the O'Neills' fortress – a typical Irish tower house, a fortified stone structure consisting of several stories with one large room per floor. As many as 8,000 may have been built in Ireland between the 15th and 17th centuries, some 2,000 of which survive in various states of repair today.

The tower house was clearly represented, along with the medieval Irish town that stood on the slopes below, in a contemporary illustration by the military cartographer Richard Bartlett. Bartlett's drawings are normally extremely reliable sources, but in this case the later relandscaping of the site made it very difficult to reconcile the archaeology with his illustration.

English star fort
Eventually, though, the Team managed to resolve the differences. The main excavation, in the centre of the old army base, uncovered not only part of the walls of the O'Neills' tower house but remains from the fort built by the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir Arthur Chichester, after the O'Neills' defeat. He had added bulwarks at each corner to create a kind of star fort, with tightly packed clay bases on which cannons would have been placed. These were excavated at great depth beneath huge quantities of hardcore dumped on the site during the construction of the army base.

Irish settlement
Other trenches further down the slopes from the castle identified the location of the original moat and what was probably remains from the Irish town, identified by quantities of domestic finds, including bone, charcoal and bits of pot. There was not, however, any clear-cut identification of a 'cabin house', one of the crude homes in which the indigenous population would have lived at the time. This was to the disappointment of the Irish archaeologists working with Time Team, who had hoped that it might prove possible to add to the handful that have been successfully excavated in Northern Ireland.

Pistol ball
A single pistol ball was probably the most evocative find of the three days. Its small size – only about one third of an inch across – identified it as the work of Scottish or French gunsmiths. These were known to have supplied Hugh O'Neill at the time of his rebellion against the English, so the ball could be fairly firmly tied to the period immediately before his defeat and the Flight of the Earls.

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