In 2007, excavation work ahead of improvements to the N9/N10 route between Kilcullen and Waterford uncovered a corn-drying kiln on a gently north-facing slope near Danesfort in County Kilkenny, set within what would once have been productive agricultural ground.

The kiln is keyhole-shaped, a form well suited to its purpose. Corn-drying kilns of this type typically consist of a bowl-shaped depression where grain was spread to dry, connected to a narrow flue through which heat was channelled; the keyhole plan reflects exactly that arrangement, with the drying bowl at one end and the flue extending to the northeast. This example was aligned southwest to northeast, and its excavation, carried out under licence E3456, was documented by Devine and Zimny in 2009 and by Devine again in 2010. Notably, a bowl furnace was identified to the west of the kiln, and the two features may belong to the same period of activity, suggesting this corner of Kilkenny's farmland once supported a small but organised range of agricultural processing. Precisely when that activity took place remains uncertain from what survives, but such kilns are associated with Irish rural life across many centuries, particularly in the medieval period.