23rd July 2011, 11:05 PM
Looks like a cool site, although are you sure its a furnace? I have never dug in Ireland or have any experience of glass furnaces but it seems a little strange to me that you do not appear to have burning other than within the stone box. I agree tmsarch that it does look rather like a cist, and if you are loking at manufacturing on any great scale there would be more debris, more waste over a wider area. Does the rest of the base area of the feature show signs of heating? It seems like a very localised fire that maybe items such as beads could have been put into?
Just throwing ideas out there - have no idea really x
But i did find an article on Irish prehistoric glass making on jstore but unfortunatley dont have access, its called "GLass and the manufacture of prehistoric and other early glass beads: technical background and theory which i think would be worth a look http://www.jstor.org/pss/20495274 or maybe you could contact these guys http://www.historyofglass.org.uk/
Just throwing ideas out there - have no idea really x
But i did find an article on Irish prehistoric glass making on jstore but unfortunatley dont have access, its called "GLass and the manufacture of prehistoric and other early glass beads: technical background and theory which i think would be worth a look http://www.jstor.org/pss/20495274 or maybe you could contact these guys http://www.historyofglass.org.uk/