2008:1074 - 5, 6, 7–8 Castle Street, Abbeyquarter South, Sligo, Tipperary

A small site, 28m by 77.5m, between Castle Street and Rockwood Parade along the Garvoge River, Abbeyquarter South, Sligo, was excavated over a four-month period from March to July 2008. One stone with lines of pockmarked decoration was discovered in the wall of No. 4 facing into No. 5 during an advance assessment in early 2007 (Excavations 2007, No. 1547).
There was a hardware store on this site from the mid-19th century until it closed in 2005. Most of the site was covered with standing buildings; there were at least one hundred and fifteen rooms, spaces, corridors, etc., in the complex. The four three-storey-with-attic street-front buildings were renovated, so only a small number of pad holes were opened within them.
The site on the south side of the Garvogue River, between the two bridges, lies between Sligo Dominican abbey of 1252 and the known location of Richard de Burgo’s Sligo castle of 1310. The castles on Castle Street are believed to have been later than the high medieval. The Market Cross, marked on the first OS maps but not seen since then, was less than a hundred metres to the west of the site. Test excavations within the centre of Sligo produced a very limited range and limited quantity of post-medieval finds.
Work on-site began with a five-week period of monitoring the demolition and removal of the standing buildings. None were found to be incorporating pre-1800 structures nor were there any further reused medieval materials. This site produced a length of MGWR 1896 rail used as a structural beam. A detailed photographic record was made of the buildings before and during demolition.
There were no structures except for a well, probably of the mid-19th century. Three shallow ditches, parallel to Castle Street and recognisable as black soil cutting into the underlying grey glacial deposits, were recognised under the southern part of the site.
Detailed analysis of the 2400 finds from the layers of black soil underlying the buildings has not yet begun but the finds tell us something of post-medieval Sligo. Most of the material recovered from this site dates from the 17th to 20th century and, as there were buildings on much of it from early in the 19th century at least, then many of the finds will probably prove to be 17th and 18th century.
There seems to be a great variety of animals represented among the 780 bones and 29 animal horns; human bones were not noted. Only three pieces of bone show evidence for working, two so-called ‘apple corers’ or marrow scoops, one only partly manufactured, and a knife handle. These bone scoops were probably made from a front leg bone of an adult deer (Timony 2007–2008a). A total of 252 oyster shells, of which there seems to be two types, 28 cockle, 11 mussel and 9 as yet unidentified shells were collected. All these shellfish could have been collected along any of the three bays adjacent to Sligo. Oyster shell predominates, as everywhere in Sligo, but the small number of cockle is surprising.
Eight organic samples, 46 soil samples and 151 pieces of wood, some of them shaped, bottoms of posts, barrel staves, the base of a vessel, the possible base of a basket and fragments of trees and bushes, were retained. None of the wood was structural.
The twenty sandstone roofing stones (Timoney 2007–2008b) suggest that there was a 17th-century building hereabouts. One fragment of a possible fabric ridge tile was recovered.
Among the 59 pieces of glass were tops, necks and bottoms of bottles; one piece of spun window glass was recovered intact.
The only clearly identifiable pieces of metal were part of a beaten brass bowl, probably of ecclesiastical origin, that may have been in the process of being cut into narrow metal strips, and a front horseshoe of post-medieval date.
Initial examination of the 235 pottery shards suggests that several are of 17th- and 18th-century date, including some from Devon as well as local wares. None seem to be medieval in date, although one seems to be late 16th-century late Saintonge ware.
Pieces of clay pipes were almost everywhere and finds of these totalled 600 pieces. All were from long thin-shank pipes. Both mouthpieces and bowls seem to be under-represented in proportion to the number of shankpieces. There were no large-bowl, 19th-century, clay pipes. Both flat-heeled and spurred types were represented. There was a concentration of 260 stems and 14 small bowls in a pit in the lower part of the site. It may be premature to suggest that the earliest of these are 17th-century clay pipes made in Bristol. Some of the stems are decorated with a roulette wheel and some bowls had a roulette impression below the rim. One bowl has ‘EB’ stamped on the foot.
Among the 133 pieces of leather were several soles and other parts of shoes, a square purse, other shaped pieces of leather and lots of scrap leather, apparently the waste from a leather workshop. It is interesting to recollect that shoes were made on these premises into the mid-20th century, so perhaps we have a continuity of this craft on this site over a period of several centuries. No leather-working tools were found.
Surprising is the absence of wooden vessels, quernstones, coins, weapons, etc.
Detailed examination of these finds, which has yet to begin in earnest, may provide evidence for trade with Galway, Bristol, western France and Holland.
In regard to Bristol it is worth recalling the doggerel:
Herring from Sligo,
and Salmon from The Bann,
Hath Made in Bristol,
Many a Rich Man.
References
Timoney, M.A. 2007–2008a An early medieval bone scoop found at Carrigeenmore, Ballymote, Co. Sligo. The Corran Herald 40, 32–33.
Timoney, M.A. 2007–2008b Roofing stones of sandstone, schist or shale. The Corran Herald 40, 46.