2001:784 - DESMOND CASTLE, Newcastle West, Limerick

Test excavations were carried out in advance of restoration works at the Old Coach House, Desmond Castle, Newcastle West, Co. Limerick. The Old Coach House is within the medieval Desmond complex of Newcastle West, later the estate of the Courtenay family, Elizabethan grantees of 1591. The coach house is south of the recently restored Desmond Hall and immediately east of the Great Hall. It is an early 19th-century construct and consists of a rectangular building, 12.7m north–south by 6.3m, with a projecting double-level porch with snub-hipped roof on its western elevation. The interior was partially lofted, with external access by means of a sack-hoist via the upper porch area. The coach house was constructed of rubble limestone bonded with mortar with a slated roof, largely intact. A wide coach entrance is centrally disposed in the northern gable, with a similar entrance in the eastern wall. The floor of the coach house consisted entirely of hard rammed clay in which cobbles had been laid. However, these cobbles had been removed in the recent past by Dúchas.

In the recent past the coach house was used as part of a builders’ providers. As part of ongoing restoration works being undertaken by Dúchas, it was necessary to lower the levels in the coach house by 0.5m overall and a by further 0.5m in an area of 1.5m by 1.5m to accommodate electrical services. Further external excavations for underpinning works were also necessary. Ultimately, five trenches were excavated.

Externally, two cuttings, Trenches 1 and 2, were excavated along the outer western limits of the structure to facilitate structural improvements. A minor external cutting, Trench 4, abutting the rear or southern gable of the coach house, was also monitored.

Trench 1, 5.7m by 0.4m, extended along the north-west exterior of the coach house. It contained a single very disturbed fill, C12, of dark brown-grey silt with modern rubbish, to a depth of 0.5m. Trench 2, 5.3m by 0.4m, extended along the south-west exterior wall of the coach house. The same fill as above extended for most of the cutting. A cohesive mortared setting of stones was also uncovered, diagonally disposed at the exterior corner of the porch as a foundation revetment and underlying C12. A second, similar coherent mass of limestone rocks, bedded in mortar, was located 2m to the south. This ran under the footings of the coach house. Trench 4, a narrow service trench 0.4m wide by 0.35m deep, was excavated along the rear exterior southern gable of the coach house. Its fill was similar to Trenches 1 and 2.

The coach house floor almost completely consisted of a single layer of hard rammed earth or clay into which a cobbled surface, now removed, had been laid. The rammed clay C1 covered and sealed the interior of the coach house entirely. It varied in depth from 0.35m to 0.52m, which more or less reflected the designated limits of excavation. Much of it contained animal bone within a tightly sealed context. In the southern half of the coach house a rectangular stone-built and plastered pit, C2, was revealed. This was filled with discarded lime, cement, bricks and other modern builders’ providers’ detritus.

A levelling layer was directly under C1 and extended throughout the coach house north of C2. A second foundation levelling layer was revealed immediately inside the eastern entrance and ramped up against the wall footing. A mortared stony surface was also revealed at the eastern entrance. As C1 was being removed in a northerly direction it began to taper in depth from 0.5m to 0.35m as a massive wall feature, C13, emerged. This feature diagonally bisected the coach house in a south-west/north-east direction.

A stone step was uncovered immediately inside the western porch area. This feature facilitated a drop in level while at the same time retaining the rammed clay floor. The step feature was made up of two courses of loosely set reused limestone. One of two dressed fragments recovered from it had longitudinal concave grooves.

Below the upper floor contexts a cohesive mortar spread or floor, C4, covered much of the inner southern half of the coach house. However, as this was revealed at the limits of the designated depth, further excavation was unnecessary.

Trench 5 began as a designated excavation of 1.5m2 to facilitate electrical services for the restoration works. On removal of C4, a packed earth layer was encountered which in turn overlay a charcoal-rich deposit, at which point C13 became manifest. Given the diagonal disposition of C13 and its average width of 1.8m, it effectively reduced the designated service trench by over 50%. As C13 no doubt represented the basal remains of a substantial curtain wall, no further reduction of the wall was undertaken. However, it was agreed with Dúchas to extend Trench 5 and to open a new transverse cutting, Trench 3, across the curtain wall.

The extension to Trench 5 revealed a distinct batter on the eastern or exterior face that bottomed at 1m. At the extreme south-west corner the wall made a dramatic 90° return, revealing a rebated terminal.

Trench 3 was opened to establish the nature of the wall feature. It measured 5.8m by 1.5m and was excavated to a depth of 1.2m. In composition the fills were similar to those in Trench 5. On removal of C4, a lighter fill similar to C1 was revealed. Underneath was a dark rubble fill which, on removal, revealed the curtain wall. The wall feature was only revealed and not excavated. As it bisected Trench 3 centrally, it effectively separated it into western and eastern areas.

In the western area a level mortar surface, C20, was encountered on the southern side of the trench abutting C13. Underneath was a homogeneous rubble levelling fill, to accommodate C20. A grey sandy fill, C28, extended over most of the western trench area. A cut feature running parallel to C13 was revealed and was possibly the original foundation trench for the curtain wall. Overlying this and interfacing with C28 a gold coin was found. All subsequent fills and cognitive spoil were sieved with a 5mm mesh. Three stake-holes, which appeared to have been fire-reddened, were cut into the natural on the north-east end of the cutting. As the western area was excavated it became apparent that there was no batter on C13 on the western side.

In the south-east corner of the trench, in the eastern area, a small section of limestone coursing was revealed, set in a mortar base. A cut feature, possibly representing the eastern foundation for C13, though shallower, was revealed. Excavation of the eastern limits revealed a pronounced batter on the eastern or outer face of the curtain wall.

The discovery of a coherent and previously unknown in situ basal section of a medieval curtain wall within the Desmond complex at Newcastle West is extremely interesting and represents the first recorded evidence of its kind within the medieval castle complex. Furthermore, the results display construction morphology and artefactual context dating by a rare gold medieval coin. The heavily clipped hammered coin, a quarter-noble minted in London, is dated to the Treaty Period, 1363–9, during the reign of Edward III.

There is archaeobotanical evidence of both crop and gathered plants. The charred plant remains were recovered from the foundation trench of the medieval wall. The assemblage of cereal grains, dominated by oats, also included wheat and barley. The plant remains are typical of those found in the medieval period.

The later upper levels in the Coach House comprised a heavy layer of rammed earth that sealed in a small faunal assemblage (270 fragments). The importance of the faunal assemblage is based largely on the sealed context and its early modern horizon for which there are very few recorded in Ireland; it therefore gives an important glimpse of the economy of the early decades of the 19th century in Newcastle West. Artefacts from the rammed earth floor consisted typically of iron nails, window and bottle glass and a few sherds of black and brown ware. One interesting find is what is possibly the shaft section of a mushroom-headed finger-turner.

3 Canal Place, Tralee, Co. Kerry