County: Waterford Site name: WATERFORD: 31 Stephen Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 03E0734
Author: Daniel Noonan, The Archaeology Company
Site type: No archaeology found
Period/Dating: N/A
ITM: E 660482m, N 612289m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 52.258988, -7.114047
The property at 31 Stephen Street, Waterford, was a mid-19th-century end-of-terrace house, the north gable of which was built on an earlier boundary wall. The site was located in an intramural position c. 30m east of the 13th-century city wall. A late 17th-century structure known as the Sailors' Home bounds the site to the immediate west. Stephen Street is part of the medieval infrastructure of Waterford that provided a routeway to the Church and Leper Hospital of St Stephen. The site was redeveloped, with a new house of similar size and style erected in its place.
The demolition of the mortar-bonded, stone-built north wall of the house along with a retaining wall to the west was carried out. No finds or features of interest were uncovered during the demolition phase. Bedrock of orange-brown shale was uncovered once the wall was removed. The retaining wall to the west was less substantial and was constructed following the terracing into the hillside that took place as part of the construction of the 19th-century house. This work also truncated an 18th-century pit that was unearthed in the south-west corner of the site. The subsequent strip foundation trenches were excavated into natural.
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