1989:062 - KILKENNY: James's Street, Kilkenny

NMI Burial Excavation Records

County: Kilkenny Site name: KILKENNY: James's Street

Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number:

Author: Claire Cotter

Site type: Historic town

Period/Dating: Multi-period

ITM: E 650439m, N 655943m

Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.652338, -7.254542

In advance of the proposed development of a large site straddling James's Street, Kilkenny, five small test trenches were investigated. The work was carried out over a four-week period in November/December 1989 and was funded by the developers - Town and County Investments plc.

The site lies within medieval 'hightown' and an extant section of the town wall, c.50m in length, forms part of the present western boundary. The area to be developed is occupied mainly by the Presentation Convent (estb. 1800) and the old James's Street Brewery (estb. 1702). The work was carried out prior to application for planning permission and the areas excavated were dictated by available vacant lots. Trench 1 was located along the interior face of the town wall, Trenches 2 and 3 lay adjacent to Chapel Lane which forms the southern boundary of the site, Trench 4 lay at the south side of Red Lane which appears in Rocque's 18th-century map of Kilkenny, and Trench 5 lay at the north side of James's Street.

The town wall
The extant section of the town wall stands to a maximum height of 4.6m (external face) and 3.3m (internal face) above present ground level. Two cruciform arrow loops are preserved but the upper levels of the wall have been rebuilt in recent times. Excavation (Trench 1) revealed that the wall had been built on a foundation plinth consisting of three courses of mortared limestone rubble (max. dimensions - 0.6m in width and 0.5m in height). The plinth sat on a layer of redeposited boulder clay up to 0.45m in thickness, which rested on the sandy gravels that form the 'natural' in this area.

The material abutting the town wall consisted of redeposited 18th/19th-century dump, landscaped to form an embankment in the convent garden. About 6m east of the wall, a scarp in the underlying gravels may be a man-made feature.

Three of the remaining trenches revealed evidence for medieval activity either in the form of accumulated garden soil with sealed medieval strata or, in the case of Trench 5, the remains of a 13th-century rubbish pit.

2 Rathmore Lawn, South Douglas Road, Cork