Protests over a planned road development through the medieval site of Carrickmines Castle were stepped up at the weekend when a group of protesters occupied the site.
An interchange for the final leg of the M50 south-eastern motorway will pass through the 13th-century site in south Dublin.
The archaeological excavations at the site were stopped on Friday after two years of work. The dig uncovered a site which was much more significant than first thought. Castle walls, buildings, kilns, wells and ditches were uncovered, as well as about 90,000 artefacts including human remains, coins and cannon balls.
Following protests from environmental and historical groups, the National Roads Authority (NRA) put forward new proposals to save more of the site,but these have been rejected by some protesters as inadequate. The Friends of Medieval Dublin have written to the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, urging that the dig continue until it has finished its work.
On Friday Prof Thomas Cooney, a planning law expert in UCD, said the State's approval of the motorway was "fatally flawed" because its Environmental Impact Statement did not show the full significance of the site.
Speaking yesterday, one of the protesters, Ms Pamela Hill, said the group was receiving strong support locally. She estimated that more than 400 members of the public visited the site over the weekend but emphasised that the excavation work was not disturbed at any time.
The NRA has said the date to finish the archaeological dig was chosen by Dúchas, the Heritage Service, in conjunction with the archaeologists on the dig. A spokesman said the significance of the site would never have been realised if it had not been for the commissioning of the dig by the road-developers.
