County: Dublin Site name: DUBLIN: Jury's Hotel site, Christchurch Place
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: Alan Hayden
Site type: Town defences and Historic town
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 715161m, N 733889m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.342685, -6.270583
The site occupies a large area bounded by Christchurch Place, Werburgh St, Ross Rd., and Nicholas St.
Archaeological rest trenching at the south-west corner of the site close to Ross Rd in 1989 and 1990 by Margaret Gowen revealed the presence of a large medieval wall crossing the site further north of the supposed line of the medieval town wall (Excavations 1989, 22).
The south-east corner of the site was to be developed as a multi-storey car park and possibly contained a further section of this wall. A total of 8.2m max. of deposits overlay subsoil.
Six trenches were opened by mechanical excavator on the 12th, 13th, and 18th March 1992. The remains of the town wall were uncovered at 8.35m OD in the westernmost trench, having been removed at an earlier date in the other trenches, where modern disturbance extended to subsoil in places.
The remains consisted of the mortared rubble core of the wall, the facing stones having been previously robbed. Organic deposits occurred on both sides of the wall. Over those to the north a large bank of redeposited subsoil occurred. All these deposits were sealed by a 3m thick layer of green garden soils that contained medieval pottery.
The wall is therefore more likely to be the pre-Norman town wall (analogous to that uncovered at Wood Quay and dated to c. AD 1100) than the Norman one judging from its apparent early destruction. Excavation of a length of this wall at the south-west corner of the site will be undertaken in early 1993.
During the test trenching, archaeological deposits were noted at the base of a cellar being cleared of its fill on the Christchurch Place streetfront. The developers generously allowed a 2 day investigation of this area before the cellar was backfilled in advance of piling. The work was undertaken on Saturday and Sunday, 14th and 15th March 1992.
In all 500mm of deposits were excavated, 3 levels of houses and laneways and a 4th level of pits were investigated. All the levels appeared to date to the later 11th/early 12th century. Well preserved post and wattle buildings aligned at right angles to a laneway that ran in a south-west/north-east direction were uncovered. A small number of finds of all types were recovered including an exceptionally fine wooden handle decorated all over in Laing's 'Primitive Style'.
The work was commissioned and funded by the developers.
15 St. Brigid's Road Upper, Drumcondra, Dublin 9
