2007:245 - Patrick’s Street/Academy Street/Emmet Place/Bowling Green Street/Faulkeners Lane, Cork, Cork

It is proposed to develop two adjacent city-centre blocks in the heart of Cork city. The proposed development site is located to the north of Patrick’s Street, c. 200m east of the medieval core of the city and within the zone of archaeological potential for Cork city (CO074–122). A Queen Anne house (CO074–108) stands within the development site. Cork city is constructed on a series of marshy islands and this area was reclaimed from the 17th century onwards and the surrounding river channels were infilled.
Nine archaeological test-trenches were excavated on the site between August and October 2007 as demolition of the standing buildings proceeded. At the lowest levels, 0.6–1m of redeposited estuarine muds, likely to have been dredged and deliberately dumped during reclamation, overlay the original marsh at c. 2m below current ground levels. Up to 1.2m of stratified deposits of rubble and rubbish overlay these muds. Deep deposits of gravel at the southern end of the site may have been dumped to raise ground levels. Three short truncated sections of wall, none more than two courses high and constructed on the reclaimed muds, are likely to be the remains of the recently demolished buildings on the site. An east–west stone drain which emerged from beneath the 18th-century former coach house, the AA building on Emmet Place, is likely to be contemporary with this building.