The site at Kellymount sits on a gentle east-facing slope, unremarkable to look at today, yet the soil held enough evidence of ironworking to identify it as a place where metal was regularly smelted, shaped, or repaired.

The evidence came to light during excavations carried out in 2007 and 2008, ahead of road improvement works on the N9/N10 route between Kilcullen and Waterford. That kind of infrastructure project, disruptive as it is, has been responsible for revealing a significant number of previously unknown archaeological sites across Ireland, and Kellymount was one of them. The iron slag, the tool fragments, and the knife, a tanged type meaning it had a pointed metal extension fitted into a handle, were recovered from features including gullies, drains, and waterholes. None of these finds pointed to a single dramatic moment; instead they suggested repeated, practical activity over time. Excavated within a few metres of the metalworking site were two further features that add context: a ring-ditch, a circular earthwork often associated with burial or ritual in prehistoric and early historic periods, and a fulacht fia, a type of burnt mound thought to relate to cooking or industrial hot-water processes, found roughly ten metres to the north-east. The clustering of these three distinct site types so close together suggests this patch of ground saw sustained and varied human use across a considerable stretch of time.