County: Cork Site name: CORK: Tuckey Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 97E0040
Author: Mary O'Donnell, Archaeological Services Unit, University College Cork
Site type: Historic town
Period/Dating: Late Medieval (AD 1100-AD 1599)
ITM: E 567212m, N 571790m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 51.897301, -8.476413
The site was excavated in advance of development over thirteen weeks from March to May 1997. A total area of approximately 140m2 was excavated. The site was situated almost midway between the main street and the enclosing east wall of the medieval city, on what was a marshy island at the time it was first occupied.
The earliest evidence for human activity was the presence of a stave-built timber fence or revetment extending east-west across the site. The staves had been set contiguously into an oak base-plate and had survived to a height of 0.85m above it, although originally they may have been at least 0.15m higher. The exact function of the structure is as yet unclear, but the later property boundaries run along much the same line as the fence/revetment and thus it may be part of the original property divisions within the city. The timbers used in the fence/revetment were felled sometime between 1115 and 1122. This is the earliest recorded activity to date in Cork City and provides definite evidence that the south island was a focal point for Hiberno-Norse activity in the area.
The ground level of the site was raised by 1.15–1.3m in the period after the fence/revetment was built, when the area was flooded three times. It is not clear whether the flooding was deliberate or accidental. The timbers from makeshift platforms used after the second flooding were felled in either 1144 or 1145.
There was approximately 1m of archaeological deposits above the thick flood levels, and these dated from the mid-late 12th century to the late 13th/early 14th century. The area continued to be divided into two properties for much of its recorded use in the medieval period, with wattle fencing replacing the stave-built construction. Apart from a possible structure associated with a hearth site at the earliest level, there was no other evidence for structures. The organic deposits in the site indicate that the area was little used, probably owing to its location, which was set well back from the main street.
Approximately 1.5m of mixed rubble, much of it modern, lay directly above the medieval layers.
