2008:448 - Vicar Street, Dublin, Dublin

This assessment was undertaken at the request of the city archaeologist to adjudicate a planning application for a hotel to the rear of the Vicar Street venue, which fronts on to the southern side of Thomas Street. The site is located within the zone of archaeological potential for the historic town of Dublin between Vicar Street and Molyneux Yard. The site has the potential to be an important one: despite its location outside of the city walls, it is situated between two medieval lanes extending to the south of Thomas Street, the main thoroughfare of the western suburb of the medieval city. In addition, it is on the eastern boundary of the Liberty of St Thomas Court and on the notional western boundary of an earlier, pre-Viking enclosure, associated with the Áth Cliath settlement to the west of the medieval city. This settlement supposedly predated the walled town and was associated with the churches of St Columba and St Mo-Lua, the latter located on the northern side of Thomas Street at its eastern end. The projected enclosure illustrated by Clarke (most recently in the Irish Historic Towns Atlas No. 11, Dublin Part I, to 1610, Dublin 2002) straddles the highest point of the ridge, centred along High Street, Corn Market and Thomas Street, incorporating the junction with Francis Street and Bridge Street. Vicar Street constitutes the southern half of its western side, with the angle on John’s Lane providing an agreeable north-western corner. There has been no material dating to the pre-Viking period recovered from this location and the site in question is ideally placed to test the theory of there being a defended enclosure on the ridge, earlier than the Viking defences.
The assessment consisted of the mechanical excavation of three trenches. There was generally found to be a homogenous deposit of dark organic clay over the natural subsoil, up to 1.5m in depth at locations where it had not been truncated by 18th- and 19th-century basements. There was a significant lack of ceramic dating evidence from the material, with a small amount of medieval and post-medieval pottery recovered. With the exception of the later basements, no pits, structures or features were observed cutting this material or indeed sealed by it, with the exception of an organic clay located at the southern end of Trench 1.
The evidence presented in the trenches strongly suggests a build-up of a substantial quantity of organic soil directly over the subsoil, with an intervening deposit recorded at the southern end of Trench 1. It has not been possible to securely date this material, however it is more likely than not to be medieval. An examination of the upper levels of the subsoil suggests that the highest point on the ridge to the west of the medieval city is actually to the south of Thomas Street, where the trajectory of the latter was previously thought to demarcate the highest ground.
The material is similar to the cultivated garden soils recorded all over the medieval city and its inner suburbs and its depth may be a function of its being in use for a considerable period. De Gomme’s 1673 representation of the area is more agricultural than residential/industrial and appears to depict field enclosures on either side of Thomas Street, with those on the northern side defined to the west of a tributary of the city watercourse which connected with Coleman’s Brook further downslope.
There was no evidence recorded for structures, pits or other indications of a more formalised occupation of the site during this period, with any early structural remains possibly associated with the first spurts of redevelopment which occurred in the 1680s and on a more sustained level, from the period immediately after the Boyne.
The domestic properties recorded along the Vicar Street frontage are generally supportive of the cartographical evidence and it would appear likely that the structures recorded on the 1939 edition of the OS are those depicted on Rocque in 1756. Work undertaken by the writer on two properties on Thomas Street (No. 60 on the eastern corner of Vicar Street and No. 55 on the eastern corner of Molyneux Yard) has identified both buildings as being built in the 1720s, and in the case of the latter, the present building replaced an earlier structure which would appear to have been there prior to 1705 (Myles 1999).
There was no linkage to the medieval structures and deposits recorded by Judith Carroll on the Thomas Street frontage to the north (Excavations 1997, No. 170, 97E0380) and, indeed, there was no evidence for any medieval industrial process recorded over the assessment, apart from the occasional recovery of cattle horns.
A fragment of a possible clay-pipe kiln located in Trench 1 was not completely unexpected in this particular part of the city. Francis Street appears to have been the centre of production throughout the post-medieval period, with evidence for its expansion southwards beyond the Coombe by the early 19th century (Alan Hayden, pers. comm.)
References
Myles, F. 1999 Building Survey of No. 55 Thomas Street, submitted as part of an MUBC degree, UCD, Richview Library.
Myles, F. 1999 Building Survey of No. 60 Thomas Street, submitted as part of an MUBC degree, UCD, Richview Library.