County: Wicklow Site name: WICKLOW: Wentworth House, Church Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 97E0118
Author: Cia Mc Conway, Archaeological Development Services Ltd.
Site type: Excavation - miscellaneous
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 731222m, N 694034m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.980977, -6.045863
Site assessment took place prior to a proposed residential and retail development. The site was a landscaped garden, located at the junction of Wentworth Place and Church Street, with a public carpark to the south and an AIB carpark and garden to the west. To the south-west of the site is a Franciscan friary which was presumably founded by the Naas FitzGeralds during the reign of Henry III, with the first contemporary record dating to around 1325, and was extended or rebuilt by the O’Byrnes in the 15th century.
Four trenches were excavated to the top of in situ archaeological deposits.
Trench 1 uncovered a large linear feature running in a north–south direction along the eastern edge of the trench. It was filled with a dusty, grey/brown garden soil with red brick, slate and stone in the upper fill. It is likely to have been a garden drainage channel.
Trench 2 uncovered several subsoil-cut features, some of which were probably root action. However, there were two regular linear features along the north-eastern edge of the trench, though a sherd of 19th-century pottery was recovered from the upper fill of one.
Trenches 3 and 4 each uncovered a linear feature, which by their nature and form were presumably the continuation of the same ditch. Pottery recovered from the basal fill of Trench 3 suggests a medieval date, though a Neolithic flint scraper also recovered from the same context could indicate prehistoric activity in the immediate vicinity.
There was the suggestion of an old ground surface—presumably medieval in date, again dated by the pottery—located along the southern edge of Trench 4.
Windsor House, 11 Fairview Strand, Fairview, Dublin 3
