Following on from their successful excavation at the 'Backstreets' area of Enniskillen in 2021, the Lough Erne Landscape Partnership (LELP) are currently undertaking their second community excavation until September 23.
Funded through the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the location for this year's investigation is Lisnaskea, with the excavation conducted as part of the LELP project entitled 'People, Place, Power and Pageantry: Exploring Fermanagh in the time of the Maguires', undertaken in collaboration with the archaeologists from the Centre for Community Archaeology at Queen's University Belfast.
The Lisnaskea area was the heartland of the Maguire lordship during the Medieval period, with their inauguration centre based at Cornashee outside the modern town, and this was once a landscape of great political power.
The focus of the excavation will be a large ring fort – a defended enclosure - at Lisdoo, which is thought may have been the main residence of the Maguire lords before they moved to where the early Seventeenth Century Castle Balfour was later built.
Previous work at Lisdoo back in the 1970s highlighted that this ring fort was certainly an important place and this fieldwork hopes to amplify our understanding of the monument and its part in Lisnaskea's Maguire story.
St Ronan's PS, Lisnaskea P5 pupils examine some of the examples of site finds at the Lisnaskea Archaeological dig
LELP Programme Manager Elmarie Swanepoel said: "We are delighted to be carrying out this fabulous community excavation here in Lisnaskea. The Maguires are such an important part of the history of the Lough Erne region, especially the Lisnaskea area.
"We are excited to see what the team and volunteers will uncover here on this site and would like to thank Mrs Jordan for allowing us to carry out the dig on her land.
"We look forward to welcoming members of the community to take part in the excavation and be part of unearthing the heritage of the site."
Pupils of St. Ronan's Primary School were in attendance, and enjoyed learning about the history of the site and being young archaeologists searching for what is buried beneath the ground.
Throughout the dig many local schoolchildren will visit the site and have the opportunity to get 'dug in'.
LELP wish to give their thanks to the local landowner Mrs. Jordan, and once again the organisation are delighted to receive support from the Historic Environment Division of the Department for Communities, and Fermanagh and Omagh District Council.
As was the case last year, members of the public who want to try their hand at being archaeologists will be able to take part in the fieldwork by registering with LELP, with daily afternoon sessions, from 2pm to 4pm, still running through to tomorrow, Friday, September 23.
Cara Johnston gets stuck into the dig at Lisnaskea with her trowel
If you would like to take part in this excavation, contact the team at info@lelp.org.uk; for further information, see www.lelp.org.uk.
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