1988:68 - WEXFORD: 89 North Main St., Townparks, Wexford

The site investigated consisted of the property at 89 North Main Street, Wexford and the owner funded the work. The street frontage had been occupied by a 19th-century two-storied shop. On demolition, this building was found to have been built directly upon a layer of builders' rubble and was without foundations or cellars. The site, which runs east-west fronts onto the west side of the street. The site measures 9m across the street front and 44m from front to rear.

Three test pits were dug during one day with the aid of a machine, all measuring 3m by 1m and oriented east-west. Each pit was excavated to a depth of c.8m or to approximately twice the depth that the foundations are expected to reach. The purpose of these pits was to determine the archaeological potential, if any, of the site and whether the development was likely to interfere with archaeological deposits.

The stratigraphy uncovered in all of these pits was remarkably similar. The lowest layer was sterile black estuarine mud of the type normally deposited naturally in broad shallow estuaries. Above this in all cases are layers of redeposited estuarine mud and builders' rubble. These layers are consistent with land reclamation and represent material brought onto the site to raise the level of the ground and to provide a firm surface for building.

Only one artefact was found during the excavation of these pits: the base of a black-glazed flat-based pottery jar found in Pit C, Layer 3. This find indicates that the reclamation may have taken place as late as the 18th or 19th century.

Neither the layers nor the pottery jar are of archaeological significance except that they indicate a late date the reclamation of this area of the town. The uniformity of the layers from the street to the rear of the plot indicate that the whole area may have been reclaimed at the same time.