Production and Distribution networks in the Diocese of Tuam, West of Ireland, AD 500-1000
Channel: Recording Archaeology
Date: 2017-03-25

The discussion of early medieval urban development in Ireland is dominated by the coastal emporia of the Vikings at Dublin, Waterford etc. As vigorous the Vikings were in facilitating broad social and economic change, they were still an ethnic minority in Ireland, so it is imperative to look at sites with little or no Viking connection. There are pre-Viking ‘ports of trade’ which while similar to English wics, although seem to develop slightly earlier and not to have an organised plan.
These include sites such as Doonloughan, a coastal site where exchange happened in the eighth century. The primary mode of the production of crops is thought to have been by buying in the grain, as there is a lack of evidence for on-site production with the grain samples excavated being entirely free of chaff. The site, and possibly others like it were not permanently used, but seems to have been occupied between late spring and early autumn, the very same as the main sailing season for much of Europe.
This form of exchange may have been brought into fruition as increased specialisation of production coupled with increased opportunities to exchange. This may have had a direct impact on the decline of the importance of the cow can be seen as a move away from the type of economy, widespread in pre-Roman Europe, where an items value was bestowed upon it not because of its intrinsic value, like that of the silver economy which the Vikings helped to develop, but in its cultural value. The silver bracelets found at places like Cushalogurt, Co. Mayo and Portumna, Co. Galway could indicate a much richer trade network through peripheral Ireland, or at least a heavier Viking presence in the area than previously thought.
While the terminology of ecclesiastical sites, particularly the use of ‘civitas’ to describe sites such as Kildare, has smudged the idea of what constituted urban in this context, it is clear that these establishments acted as centres of production and distribution, in a way that ringforts could not in the unstable political milieu of the day. This research is focused on the Diocese of Tuam, centred on Tuam, which was a centre of exchange in this period, with a high cross being erected to delineate the boundary of the secular and the ecclesiastical. The role of the church in providing centres of production and manufacture cannot be doubted, especially in the unstable and fragmented political milieu of early medieval Ireland.
While market exchange was seen as primarily an urban phenomenon, sites such as Doonloughan and Tuam have shown that despite the west of Ireland being largely ignored when talking about the Early Medieval Irish economy, its peripheral nature then and now, mitigates the problem of modern urban development that is common, particularly among the environments of formerly Viking emporia. I hope, through this work, to provide a framework for further investigation of the early medieval economy, not only within Ireland, but also for other comparable regions of Europe.

Author - Tighe, John, Trinity College Dublin, The University of Dublin, Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland (Presenting author)