County: Waterford Site name: WATERFORD: 8 Catherine Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 01E0352
Author: Dave Pollock
Site type: Historic town
Period/Dating: Multi-period
ITM: E 660931m, N 612174m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.257899, -7.107495
Foundations and service trenches for a new development of townhouses behind Catherine Street were monitored in August and September. The site is on low ground outside the walled city, on the floodplain of John’s River, and at the edge of a low rise or island once occupied by St Catherine’s Abbey. Catherine Street, previously known as Colbeck Street, provided access between abbey and city.
In the main development area post-medieval garden soil and building debris overlay earlier cultivation soil (generally not disturbed by the development). The main service trench, cut to Catherine Street, sliced through a 19th-century cellar beside the street (and disturbing the ground well in under the street). The cellar was cut into a post-medieval soil extending to c. 2m below pavement level, over an infilled ditch to at least 2.2m below pavement level. The ditch would have helped to drain the medieval site, perhaps at the edge of the abbey precinct.
Knockrower Road, Stradbally, Co. Waterford
