2008:715 - 44–48 Kieran Street, Kilkenny, Kilkenny

CRDS Ltd has been retained by Glenman Ltd to act as archaeological consultants in advance of a new development at Nos 44–48 Kieran Street, Kilkenny. The site is located on the west side of (St) Kieran Street, which is within the medieval town of Kilkenny. It lies within Kilkenny’s zone of archaeological potential as identified in the Urban Archaeological Survey and is adjacent to St Mary’s Church.
The site was formerly occupied by houses. Following the collapse of these buildings in the 1960s the area was cleared and a retaining wall was built along the rear of the site. This retaining wall consisted of two distinct phases of construction of a series of ‘raised beds’. This effectively divided the site into an upper/raised and lower portion. The lower portion of the site served as a builder’s yard and a carpark from that period until the archaeological excavations commenced.
CRDS have acted as archaeological consultants for this development since 2002. This has included various stages of work including an assessment and testing in 2003 by Richard Clutterbuck (Excavations 2003, No. 1023, 03E1204) and monitoring in 2006 (Excavations 2006, No. 1064). These works were undertaken to best inform the design strategy of the development.
Between July and October 2006 Claire Cotter completed an excavation in advance of the current development (Excavations 2006, No. 1065). The excavation was completed to accommodate the development’s foundation plan and undertaken to the level of 0.6m below the finished floor level (FFL) of the final development. A series of medieval and post-medieval deposits, surfaces, quarrying pits and masonry were exposed. A post-medieval oven and the remains of the 19th-century terrace were also recorded. Significantly, a small amount of disarticulated human bone but no burials from the adjacent St Mary’s Abbey was recovered.
In March 2007 a small excavation was completed to allow for a change in the development’s design. This followed several changes to both the build’s design and FFL. This included a reapplication from the client to Kilkenny planning borough in 2007. Planning was subsequently granted in November 2007 but, arising from the changes to the development, a new archaeological condition requested excavation of all archaeological deposits within the development’s footprint to the level of natural subsoil, as distinct from excavation to accommodate the build’s FFL.
New archaeological works were required as a result of this condition. The first phase of these was undertaken from 26 March to 9 May 2008. The licence from the 2006 excavation was extended for these works. These excavations were concentrated on the lower portion of the site; with the raised beds left undisturbed. This excavation revealed a series of medieval and post-medieval features including walls, slot-trenches, road surfaces, quarry and rubbish pits.
The earliest features on-site appeared to be a series of post-holes, stake-holes and two slot-trenches located in the south-eastern end of the site. These were sealed below a medieval wall and appear to represent the original river defences when the Nore extended towards St Mary’s, prior to the reclamation of Kieran Street in the 13th century. Following the reclamation of Kieran Street, a cobbled road was constructed and the remains of this extend across the length of the site. This appears to have gone out of use relatively quickly with a series of organic deposits accumulating over it. A series of large medieval quarry pits (initially exposed in 2006) were cut through both the organic deposit and the cobbled surface.
Around this period a medieval wall was also constructed centrally on the site. This may have served as an early boundary to the adjacent St Mary’s Church. Most of this wall appears to have been removed although portions were incorporated into the foundations of the later post-medieval and 19th-century structures on-site. A range of walls and services such as drains and rubbish pits associated with these later structures were also recorded.
Following the excavation, monitoring was undertaken of the removal of the raised beds at the rear of the site. This commenced on 9 June 2008. Intact human remains were encountered on 28 June. Works were immediately ceased and the NMS, NMI, Gardaí and County Coroner were informed. The rear wall of St Mary’s was shown not to extend to the base of the development as originally thought. Instead it was shown that about half the wall was consolidated by 19th-century masonry associated with the old terrace on the site, while the remainder of the wall was built on intact graveyard stratigraphy.
The reduction of the raised beds potentially would compromise the integrity of the rear wall of St Mary’s and immediate underpinning of the wall was required. Underpinning involves the successive excavation of 1m by 1m by 0.5m ‘boxes’, before shuttering and replacement of the soil with mass concrete. With the approval of the NMS and NMI it was agreed to excavate these sections removing any remains before the contractor completed the underpinning, thus insuring the structural integrity of the wall.
A second phase of excavations was undertaken in July under the direction of the writer and Ciara Travers, consultant osteoarchaeologist. In total 66 individuals were removed, all of which are thought to be high medieval in date. Health and safety precluded the removal of complete individuals and only the portion of the skeletons contained within the underpinned sections (i.e. 0.5m in depth) could be excavated. All spoil was sieved on-site to recover disarticulated bone. As works were conducted from a height against the section face of St Mary’s wall, all excavation was undertaken from a cherry picker. The strategy of removal was prepared in consultation with the NMS, NMI, the consultant osteo-archaeologist and health and safety advisers of CRDS and Glenmans. Distinct grave-cuts were not visible for the burials, with most of them buried in a few distinct deposits. The burials were frequently cut into each other as is typical of urban graveyards of this type/period. A single pit from two underpinned sections was found to contain fourteen individuals but otherwise the burials were conducted separately. At the south-eastern end of the site the natural hill running from the Nore to St Mary’s was not entirely removed by the construction of the 1970s raised beds and two intact burials were found in this area.
During the July excavations about half the raised beds were removed, with the rest left in place as support until the graveyard wall was consolidated. Once these works were completed, intermittent monitoring was undertaken to facilitate the developers’ build. However, a third phase of archaeological works was required in January 2009, which will be reported on in the bulletin of that year.