1999:449 - KILKENNY CASTLE, The Parade, Kilkenny, Kilkenny

From 1991 to 1993, a series of excavations was conducted by the writer in order to facilitate the restoration of the central wing of the castle, which is a historic property in state care (Excavations 1991, 29–30; Excavations 1992, 39–40; see also Old Kilkenny Review (1993), 1101–17). From February 1995 to February 1998 a second series of excavations was conducted in and around the south tower to facilitate the restoration of the parade wing (Excavations 1997, 102–4). From October 1998 to November 1999 a third phase of excavations was conducted. This concentrated on two areas of the castle.

Area A: the south-west half of the castle yard
Here an extensive series of cuttings was excavated for the laying of services. Some of these extended beyond the castle yard. Although the eight cuttings involved were dug at different times over the space of one year, each adjoined at least one other. This helped to provide a broader picture of stratigraphy below ground.

Cutting 17 was a long, linear trench that was excavated from the south-west side of the castle yard, in a south-west direction, through the passageway of the gateway in the parade wing and out into the middle of the parade in front of the castle. The north-east half of the cutting revealed a great deal of modern disturbance, particularly from pipes etc. running beneath the passage of the gateway.

Nevertheless, the findings from this cutting confirmed some of those revealed in cuttings from the earlier programmes of excavation in the vicinity. For example, it showed that the facade of the present gateway, which dates from c. 1700, was inserted through the curtain wall of the 13th-century stone castle. Furthermore, it confirmed that this facade is built on the top of the base batter of the demolished section of the curtain wall.

The cutting also confirmed that the 13th-century base batter truncates the rampart of the earlier earthwork castle of c. 1170. On the outside of the present gateway the base batter descends into the moat. Previous excavations have shown that the latter was filled in during renovations carried out in the second half of the 17th century and sealed with a metalled surface when the present parade was laid out in front of the castle. The ground level was subsequently raised, with the laying of a series of metalled surfaces. These were encountered during the excavation of Cutting 17.

At the south-west end of the cutting the excavation was deepened to 3.65m, beneath the present road surface, to reveal a large, stone-built culvert. This runs in a south-east/north-west direction along the middle of the parade and appears to date to the 18th century. It was set into a deep trench, which was dug from the level of one of the later metalled surfaces.

Cutting 18 was in a corridor in the parade wing, to south-east of Cutting 17, at the north-west of the south tower. The excavation was required for the laying of underfloor services. At the south-west end, where the 13th-century curtain wall and adjoining south tower had been truncated, the top of the underlying base batter was exposed. Throughout the rest of the cutting, the remains of the rampart of the 12th-century earthwork castle were exposed. The latter had been truncated by the foundations of the parade wing, which was constructed in the 1860s.

Cuttings 19, 25, 26 and 27 were a series of adjoining cuttings, in the castle yard, which extended south-east from the north-east end of Cutting 17 on the inside of the gateway, to the line of the missing south-east curtain wall of the 13th-century castle, at the north-east of the south tower. They were delineated on the north-east side by Cutting 25, a shallow, linear trench, which was excavated to 0.75m deep. The other cuttings varied between 0.3m and 1.6m deep.

At the south-east end, Cuttings 25 and 27 were on either side of Cutting 14, which was excavated in 1995. These exposed the remains of the base batter of the missing south-east curtain wall. The outer face had been destroyed by the construction of a parallel underground passageway, which was built in 1862.

Running parallel to the inside of the destroyed curtain wall, all three cuttings revealed the remains of the foundation of a destroyed 17th-century building that formerly ran along the south-east side of the castle yard. Along with the curtain wall, it was demolished during the second half of the 18th century.

Both the above foundation and the 13th-century base batter truncated the rampart of the 12th-century earthwork castle. To date, the three programmes of excavation have revealed that the 13th-century curtain wall was built along the outside of the ridge of the earlier earthen rampart. The latter was constructed of redeposited glacial material excavated from the fosse surrounding the 12th-century fortress. This appears to have been a ringwork, built by Earl Strongbow and burnt down in 1173 (see OKR 1993, 1108–11).

The excavations to date have shown that the ground level in the interior of the earthwork fortress was raised by redeposited glacial material, thus burying the old ground surface. This may have been carried out during the building of the stone castle, when the outside of the rampart and the underlying inner slope of the fosse were truncated by the construction of the towers and the base batter of the curtain wall. On the inside of the demolished south-east curtain wall, the original ground level is c. 1.3m beneath the present castle yard.

Approximately 15m to the north-west of the south-east curtain wall and c. 9m from the north-west one, in Cuttings 19 and 26, beneath the redeposited layers of glacial material, two layers of silty clay and organic material were encountered, totalling 0.33m thick. They contained flecks of charcoal, charred wood fragments and chippings. This horizon overlay a metalled surface, which was 1.6m beneath the present castle yard. No datable artefacts were recovered from these lower levels, which were only briefly investigated before being backfilled to facilitate the laying of services, but they would appear to date from the time of the earthwork castle.

Cutting 23 was a continuation of service trench/Cutting 25, extending south-east from the outside of the demolished south-east curtain wall of the 13th-century castle, for a distance of 43.3m, across the park to an oil house. It was 0.75m wide and contained a 0.6m-thick layer of building waste and redeposited clay. Beneath this, towards the south-east end, a metalled surface was encountered, which was covered by the above layer in the later 18th century. The excavation of the trench stopped at this level.

Cutting 24 was a wide trench, the north-east side of which was a continuation of Cutting 25 to the south-east. It extended north-west from the north-east end of Cutting 17 to the north-west corner of the castle yard. This area had been partially excavated (Cutting 9) in 1992. A great deal of disturbance was encountered owing to the laying of earlier services. The undisturbed stratigraphy consisted mainly of layers of redeposited glacial material. Beneath this the pre-1170 sod was revealed.

At the north-west end of the cutting the remains of a medieval stone passageway were encountered. Previous excavations (Cutting 3) carried out in 1992 showed that this feature ran in a north-west direction, beneath the present central wing of the castle towards a 13th-century sallyport, which was excavated during 1991 and 1992 (Cuttings 5 and 7). It truncated the redeposited glacial layers and overlay an earlier passageway that appears to have had a timber revetment on either side.

Area B: the north-west side of the castle
These cuttings were a continuation of excavations that were carried out during 1991 and 1992.

Cutting 5A was an extension of Cutting 5, which was excavated beneath a 19th-century cellar, to the north-east of the west tower. Here the lower 12th-century rampart layers and the underlying original ground level were found.

Cuttings 7 and 8 were excavated in 1991–2 and were extended during 1999. They were beneath the floor of a 19th-century, semi-underground passageway that runs north-east from the west tower. The excavations here exposed the base batter of the 13th-century curtain wall and a contemporary sallyport. The work during 1999 exposed the remains of a post-medieval terrace that was built on the base batter and was demolished when the moat was being filled in during the renovations of the second half of the 17th century.

The extension of Cutting 7 from the south-west side of the sallyport, as far as the west tower, revealed a stairway that gave access to an outward projection from the above terrace.

Cuttings 10A, 20 and 21 were in the rose garden to the north-west of the castle. Here a deep cutting (10) had been excavated in 1992 (OKR 1993, fig. 3), which exposed the bottom of the 13th-century base batter down in the moat. The work in 1999 involved the excavation of deep service trenches extending from Cutting 10. In these the stratigraphy removed came from the upper build-up of ground over the moat, which dated to around 1700.

Cutting 22 was in the ground chamber of the west tower. It was a shallow trench, which exposed a horizon of redeposited ash and occupation material that produced finds dating to the later 17th century. A similar horizon was encountered in the excavation of the interior of the south tower (Cutting 15), where it was used as a bedding for the laying of a cobbled floor. Accordingly, it is likely that the present 19th-century flagged floor replaced a cobbled one.

Primrose Hill, Threecastles, Co. Kilkenny