2006:1052 - Bishop’s Palace Grounds, Kilkenny, Kilkenny

In advance of the construction of a new See House and work on the former Bishop’s Palace, a historic and archaeological landscape study of the palace garden was commissioned. Eight small trenches were cut by hand to investigate parts of the grounds.
Much of the wall enclosing the old garden at the Bishop’s Palace was built in the 18th century, including the curved sweep beside the former Drysdale’s Lane, potentially on the line of the medieval precinct wall. When the garden was extended in the mid-19th century the extension was enclosed behind a new wall, with a new east gate, incorporating a few fragments of older walls along the south-west side.
Most or all of the north-east wall, beside Vicar Street, was taken down, set back and rebuilt in concrete during road widening in the 20th century, but without significantly changing the garden.
Some of the medieval precinct wall, which may have been part of the city wall, should have survived below the 18th-century replacement around much of the remainder of the old garden circuit.
The palace may have been attached to the north-east corner of a rectangular precinct around the cathedral. If this is the case, remains of medieval walls or ramparts can be expected under the rose garden and the carriage drive.
In the old garden test-trenches cut down only to 17th- and 18th-century levels. The path between the present lawn and the palace has been used at least from this time, when it was perched at the top of a significant slope falling northwards under the present lawn. Beside the present rose garden, in the 18th century, a considerable mound of construction debris (from the Robing Room and elsewhere?) was roughly levelled, the path was carried over and soil was imported for garden beds.
Late in the 18th century, or early in the 19th, the lawn area was levelled. A distinctive mixed soil filled the hollows and banked up against the back of the garden wall. The levelled ground may have been left to grass or orchard, with planting along the (south-facing) back of the garden wall.
To extend the garden in the mid-19th century some of the 18th-century garden wall was taken down and rubble banked against the outside of the stump. Houses beside the former Drysdale’s Lane were thoroughly demolished and some of the debris was dropped into rubble drains. Imported topsoil was spread over the site of the roadside buildings.
An extraordinary depth of imported topsoil was dumped into quarried ground downhill from the former houses. The exact date of the quarries (gravel pits) is unclear. They were probably opened during the extension of the garden but may be a century older. The quarrying damaged archaeological levels under the former tennis court, and significantly in the footprint of the proposed new See House.
The test excavations succeeded in identifying former (post-medieval) ground levels but could not provide garden plans. The edge of an 18th-century bed was identified under the edge of the present rose garden, but this throws little light on the overall arrangement at the time.

Editor’s note: Although this licence was issued during 2005, the report on the work was not received in time for inclusion in the bulletin of that year.