County: Louth Site name: DROGHEDA: John Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 96E0259
Author: Donald Murphy, Archaeological Consultancy Services Ltd.
Site type: Excavation - miscellaneous
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 708727m, N 774817m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.711703, -6.352946
Archaeological testing of a proposed housing development at John Street, Drogheda, was carried out in September 1996.
The development site lies just inside the town wall and St John's Gate.
Three trenches were excavated by machine to the top of archaeological deposits, and certain areas within these trenches were further excavated by hand in order to assess the depth of archaeological stratigraphy. The trenches were located in areas where it was considered the greatest disturbance would take place. The three trenches are fairly representative of the site as a whole and substantial archaeological deposits were present in each. Substantial post-medieval deposits overlay medieval garden soils, which occur at a depth of 0.8–1.3m below present ground level. Timber boxes were uncovered in one of the trenches and may have been used for tanning during the post-medieval period.
A substantial post-medieval wall was also uncovered in one of the trenches, and clay-bonded walls of medieval date were uncovered in two trenches. Both of the clay-bonded walls were running on a north-south axis but their extent was not established.
Finds from the site included sherds of Leinster cooking ware, medieval local ware, sherds of Cheshire pottery and Saintonge. A roof ridge tile and a plain floor tile fragment, both of medieval date, were also recovered.
30 Laurence St., Drogheda, Co. Louth
