2006:803 - GALWAY: Taaffe’s Shop, William Street, Galway

Testing was undertaken at Taaffe’s Shop, William Street, Galway, prior to a proposed retail development. The site is located within the area of archaeological potential of the medieval city of Galway and includes a protected structure, Taaffe’s Shop (in a dilapidated state of repair). Test-trenching commenced at the site on 28 June 2006 and lasted for four days. This was carried out using a tracked mini-excavator with a flat, toothless bucket. Six trenches were mechanically investigated across the test area, which measured c. 650 m. These trenches were placed running perpendicular to William Street and took account of all obstacles within the building, such as pillars, stairs and in situ stone floor slabs.

Trench 1 was excavated from south-east to north-west and revealed a stratigraphy almost entirely consisting of various garden soils. A large dump of stones, 3.4m in length, was encountered midway along the trench. Trench 2 was excavated from north-west to south-east and revealed a stratigraphy broadly similar to Trench 1. Two pieces of cut stone were recovered from garden soil in this trench, both with a similar square depression cut into their finished face, which measured c. 0.09m by 0.09m. The stones themselves measured c. 0.45m by 0.45m. These appear to be a pair of door or pillar supports and could date to the 17th or 18th centuries.

At the north-west end of Trench 3 a stone wall was noted running north-east/south-west across the trench. This wall matches perfectly the line of wall found in Trench 1 and it can be taken that they are in fact the same wall, measuring c. 1.1m in width. Both the wall and the cobble/clay layer (visible at either side) were sealed by a post-medieval layer, which may suggest that the wall and cobbles are of a similar post-medieval date. A single broken fragment of medieval glazed tile, as well as much post-medieval pottery, were recovered from garden-soil in this trench. Due to the constraints of the machine used, these trenches could not be dug any deeper than 2m, despite not having reached natural geological material.

Trench 4 was excavated in two parts, on either side of an old clay sewer pipe that ran across it roughly halfway along its length. It had a somewhat simple stratigraphy, with concrete overlaying gravel which in turn overlay a dark-brown sticky garden-soil layer with shell and bone inclusions (although nothing datable). No archaeological material was encountered in Trenches 5 or 6, located within the north-west and north-east corners respectively of the standing street-fronted building.

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