2002:0372 - YOUGHAL: ‘The Priory’, 56 Main Street North, Cork

Pre-development testing was carried out at ‘The Priory’, 56 Main Street North, Youghal, as part of the grant of planning permission for redevelopment of the property. The building is known locally as St John’s Priory and is recorded as an abbey by the Urban Archaeological Survey.

Gwynn and Hadcock (1988, 108) record the existence of a Benedictine priory in Youghal in 1306. It was a ‘hospital-cell’ (along with others at Cork and Waterford), a type of Benedictine foundation that is rare outside Ireland (ibid.) A maison dieu was founded for or by the Benedictines at Youghal in 1185, with an associated leper house on a hill outside the town. A maison dieu was often a short-lived foundation established by laypeople (Gilchrist 1995, 13–14). By 1306 the Benedictine presence seems to have been more firmly established inside the walled town, with the foundation of a structure known as St John’s House on Main Street. The house appears to have been a small dependent cell of the Benedictine house at Bath and operated as a hospital-cell. Youghal was one of the main entry ports into the Anglo-Norman colony in Ireland and was a prime candidate for such a foundation. Hayman (1854, 51) attributes a foundation date of 1350 to St John’s Priory, as a subordinate of the Benedictine priory of St John the Baptist in Waterford (1185), and states that the building was a ‘mortuary bequest’. In 1366 rents and income from the property were 16s. 8d., for building and subsidiaries; in 1590 income had dropped considerably, with the messuage known as St John’s House having an annual value of 8d. (ibid.). Cromwell is reputed to have used the priory as his headquarters during his stay in Youghal in the winter of 1649–50.

An assessment of the building in 2000 identified its architectural and archaeological components. The structure is laid out in four spaces: the main retail area fronting the street on the east, a kitchen to the west of the shop, a yard beyond, and a long, narrow corridor running along the south wall through the building from east to west, bounded by a poorly built rubble stone wall on the north. All of the spaces are confined within a single rectangular structure. The building was found to have four main phases of construction, the main core being of medieval date. The core of the building is a rectangular hall-like structure, measuring 9.45m north–south by 22.6m externally, formed by the four walls of the property, with surviving medieval features such as the piscina and wall cupboards in the south wall and stone corbels for timber workings in both the north and the south wall. A passageway through the building, entered from the street through the decorated medieval doorway, is possibly later than the main structure. After a period of neglect, a new gable was inserted in a central position in the structure in the late 18th/early 19th century. Modern accretions are also visible within the structure.

The redevelopment of the building involved the construction of a new steel structure within the existing building, built on a raft foundation above any potential archaeological sediments. To establish the nature of the archaeological sediments beneath the existing floor levels, testing was carried out in the kitchen and yard areas. Three test-trenches were manually excavated. An orange/brown clay floor was revealed in the shop area when the concrete floor had been removed.

Trench 1, in the yard, measured 2.5m north–south by 0.7m and was 0.35m in maximum depth. The modern concrete floor was removed, and the trench was dug by hand. A mixed overburden of modern and post-medieval material, as dated by potentially 18th-, 19th- and 20th-century pottery, was removed. Below was a compact, yellow/orange clay surface at 0.35m below present ground level (1.368m OD). A roughly laid paving of subangular sandstones was set into this clay surface.

Trench 2 ran through the kitchen and yard; it measured 6.6m east–west by 0.6m and was 0.4m in maximum depth. The mixed overburden of modern and post-medieval material was removed. The nature of the overburden varied from the kitchen to the yard. In the yard it was largely mixed layers of silts, brick and stone, the result of being in an open-air space that was later concreted over to form surfaces for outhouses. Beneath the kitchen surface the overburden was a single rubble deposit of mortar and stone. Finds from this included a fragment of a brown-glazed, possibly late medieval ridge tile. The overburden was removed down to the same compact clay surface uncovered in Trench 1. The level of the clay surface varied in this trench, with a definite inclination from east to west.

A small test-hole was excavated centrally in the trench through the high point of the clay surface to a depth of 0.25m. It revealed a sequence of two clay layers with an intervening, compacted, organic layer. The upper layer was compact, orange/brown clay with occasional charcoal flecks and very occasional small grit. Beneath was compacted, dark brown, slightly clayey silt with a high organic content. Sieving a sample of this material produced charcoal, organic fibres, fish and animal bone, seeds and shell fragments. A small sherd of green-glazed, possibly medieval pottery was recovered from the organic layer. This layer was on top of several roughly laid stones, which were at a similar level to the rough paving recorded in Trench 1. The next layer in the sequence was compact, light brown/beige clay with occasional charcoal flecks.

Trench 3, in the kitchen, measured 4.5m north–south by 0.75m and was 0.4m in maximum depth. The rubble overburden, as in Trench 2, was removed down to the level clay surface, where excavation ceased. The southern end of the trench revealed this clay bonded into the foundation courses of the north wall of the corridor and suggested that they are contemporaneous.

After consultation, a raft foundation with self-contained pads was designed to be installed above a buffer zone over the clay surface, thereby preserving it in situ. The removal of the overburden was subsequently monitored. The formation level of the inserted floor did not reveal the clay surface further. The lower courses of the northern and western walls of the medieval structure were revealed and recorded.

Monitoring of the removal of wall fabric from the inserted gable was also carried out. No further features or finds of archaeological significance were revealed.

References
Gilchrist, R. 1995 Contemplation and action: the other monasticism. Leicester.
Gwynn, A. and Hadcock, R.N. 1988 Medieval religious houses: Ireland. London.
Hayman, S. 1854 Notes and records of the ancient religious foundations at Youghal, Co. Cork, and its vicinity. Youghal.

47 North Main Street, Youghal, Co. Cork