County: Waterford Site name: DUNGARVAN: Moloney's Store, Parnell Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR 31:40 Licence number: 99E0706
Author: Dave Pollock
Site type: Building
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 626013m, N 593597m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.093676, -7.620363
A large 19th-century store in the middle of the medieval town was surveyed and tested ahead of refurbishment, and a large part of the site was subsequently excavated, inside the shell of the building.
The site appeared to have been occupied by two generations of timber-framed buildings through the medieval period (from the start of the 13th century) and then by a mortared stone building, which was largely removed and replaced by the present store in the early 19th century. Much of the north gable wall of the earlier stone building (at least two storeys) was incorporated into the later structure but was demolished during refurbishment.
The medieval timber-framed buildings were poorly represented, as no structural timberwork had penetrated the ground. The roadside end of the earlier building (1) had been cut away by a cellar under its successor; the surviving end was represented by two clay floors with a sharp edge (but no timber impressions) defining the wall line. A large pit inside the building had been filled in (with brushwood?) and capped with set beach cobbles and a continuation of the clay floor.
The beach gravel surface of the medieval marketplace appeared to extend onto the site, to an original street-front line c. 2m behind the present one.
The second timber-framed building was represented by drains on at least two sides and a central cellar cut, c. 3.5m x 3.5m. The drain at the front of the building was replaced with a deep linear sump (stone and midden fill), presumably boarded over. The building appears to have had a wooden ground floor over the cellar (or cavity, only c. 0.6m deep).
The stone building replacing the second timber-framed building (in the late 17th century?) encroached on the marketplace and toed the present line. The building originally had a single substantial cross-wall, but a passage was inserted across the rear of the building, associated with a pair of rectangular stone-lined pits.
Knockrower Road, Stradbally, Co. Waterford
