2008:446 - Frawley’s, 32–36 Thomas Street, Dublin, Dublin

A single test-trench was dug inside the former department store in May 2008, to accompany a planning application for redevelopment of the site.
The location of the trench, measuring 5m by 5m, was selected to overlie the ‘long garden’ of St Thomas’s Abbey, vestiges of which remained on Rocque’s 1756 map. The present building was supported on concrete piles, which rested on larger concrete pads. These did not extend further than c. 0.5m into the underlying deposits. The overall depth to subsoil was c. 2.4m, at which stage water ingress occurred. Concrete and hardcore were found to 0.3m below present ground level. At the east end of the trench, two concrete pads for the pillars of the former shop extended into the trench. The southern one extended to a depth of c. 0.5m. Red-brick rubble and mortar extended to a depth of 0.7m, except at the slab where it was deeper. A brick-free dark-grey gritty silt underlay this and continued to subsoil.
The upper levels of the silt contained post-medieval material, with exclusively medieval (13th-century) material towards the lower 0.6m. The steeply sloping edge of a linear cut of medieval date was exposed along the south side of the trench. This was evidenced by a sloping cut to the south, and also by a differentiation in the deposits which filled the cut. The fills consisted mainly of fairly soft lenses of silt, pale sod-like deposits with occasional twigs. Several sherds of medieval pottery were recovered from this fill, noticeably more than from the overlying deposits, which were comparatively sterile. The maximum depth of the cut, where it extended into the southern part of the trench, was 0.4m.
There was no evidence for a cemetery in the test-trench.