Yet what Pat Kerrigan collected along the northern bank of the Inny River in the Westmeath townland of Clonkeen may represent the earliest traces of human activity in this corner of the Irish midlands. A lithic scatter, as the term suggests, is simply a concentration of worked stone left behind by prehistoric people making or using flint or chert tools; the scatter itself is the site, and often the only evidence that survives. Chert, a fine-grained silica rock found widely across Ireland, was shaped into blades and flakes in much the same way as flint, and was a favoured material for Mesolithic toolmakers.

The location has an added layer of complexity. The findspot sits adjacent to a cut-away bog, in ground where material dredged from the Inny River was deposited during drainage works in the 1960s. That disturbance matters: it means the chert pieces may have been displaced from their original context, which is why the site is described as a possible prehistoric scatter rather than a confirmed one. Even so, the wider landscape is thick with Mesolithic presence. Within two kilometres to the north-east and east lie at least four other recorded Mesolithic sites, including a habitation site and several further lithic scatters, clustered around the Inny corridor and within reach of Lough Derravaragh's shoreline. Mesolithic people in Ireland, broadly active from around 8000 to 4000 BC, tended to settle near water, and this low-lying river and lakeside terrain would have offered exactly the resources they needed. Kerrigan eventually reported his finds to Melanie McQuade, Heritage Officer at Westmeath County Council, and to Isabella Mulhall of the National Museum of Ireland, bringing a quietly accumulated personal collection into the formal archaeological record.