2010:033 - Dunluce Castle, Dunluce, Antrim

This project was initiated in 2008 (Excavations 2008, No. 28) to investigate the history of the castle, its associated 17th-century town and surrounding landscape, and formed part of a major research initiative examining the archaeology of later medieval lordship and the Plantation of Ulster in the early part of the 17th century. The project was conceived and funded by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) and was conducted by archaeologists from the University of Ulster and the Queen’s University, Belfast. The 2010 season concentrated in two main areas: Trench 3 in the castle interior and Trench 7 in the ‘townfield’.
It is suggested here that the foundations uncovered during the 2009–10 season in Trench 3 constitute the original foundations of a late medieval hall, built by the MacQuillans. The building, a masonry structure, rectangular in plan, would originally have had an overall length of approximately 14.8m and an 11m width. Internally it would have measured 13m in length width a width of 8.5m. It is impossible to indicate how many storeys this structure originally had but it was likely to have had a slated roof given the presence of some slate fragments in the fill of the foundation trench. This was centrally placed on the castle promontory and was associated with the two late 15th-century towers that still stand on the site.
Trench 7 was excavated over a six-week period in May and June 2010. A 12m x 11m trench was positioned in the south-west sector of the large townfield adjacent to the castle in an attempt to interrogate the junction between the two streets identified through the 2009 geophysical survey and located during the 2009 excavation season (Excavations 2009, No. 37). A road surface was immediately apparent in the southern end of the trench running east–west. This consisted of irregular-shaped stones laid flat to create a round and uneven surface. It is likely that a deposit of compacted clay would originally have been laid down on and between the stones to create a more even surface. A number of features were contained in this road including the placement of a large stone at the south-eastern corner of an adjacent blacksmith’s workshop that acted as a jostle stone preventing carts running against the corner of the structure.
The blacksmith’s workshop measured 5.2m x 4.8m internally. The building was orientated on an east–west axis with its western gable running parallel to the north-west-running roadway. It was positioned deliberately at the junction of two streets and as such would have been positioned very strategically in terms of entering the town and approaching the castle. Originally it would have been a three-sided structure with a set of large wooden doors that would have opened out to the east. Its northern wall was heavily robbed out but its base was of drystone construction using large basal stones laid flat, and would have been c. 0.8m wide. Little remained of the western gable due to later robbing and usage of this area in the 18th century when the adjacent street accommodated the Dunluce fair. This wall would originally have accommodated the forge and an associated chimney off-centre on its southern section. The original masonry associated with the chimney flume had collapsed or had been deliberately pushed forward and the rough outline and form could be discerned in the stratigraphic sequence. This would have been mortared with a tall projecting element over 4.5m in height. The surviving base of the feature survived and consisted of a linear series of large stones laid flat at the front of the feature and a further packed spread of smaller flat stones laid immediately to the rear. Significant traces of burning, including charcoal and stone staining, were found on these stones and it is clear this functioned as a large hearth at the base of the forge. A masonry structure would originally have been built up around this but the remnants of this only survived on its southern edge where an in situ base of a mortar-bonded masonry double-block wall stood three courses high. Significant quantities of clinker were spread along the base of this wall and a small mound of four horseshoes was contained within this. Clinker represents the waste by-product from iron production and is formed from the oxygen in the furnace and impurities in the slag and fuel. It frequently forms around the tuyère or the opening where air is pumped into the furnace to raise the temperature.
The floor surface of the building consisted of heavily compacted clay, 0.05–0.1m thick, that was visibly very black due to the quantities of burnt materials that had been trodden into it and the general nature of working practises in this type of environment. A large collapsed stone block sat in a central depression 1m east of the hearth which may have been the position of the wooden block for the anvil. Interestingly the ground surface east of this is clearer of surface deposition and this may be indicative of an area where more movement by the tradesmen took place. There is a 1.9m space between the hearth and the northern wall. A chisel and a number of L-shaped hanging nails were found in this location possibly indicative of the former position of the blacksmith’s bench where he kept his tools in order. A further concentration of hanging nails was found in a rough linear arrangement along the base of the northern wall where further tools and implements must formerly have hung.
What survive outside Dunluce’s castle walls are the intact foundations of a complete town built at an important and highly significant period in Ulster’s history in the first decade of the 17th century. This was a town established and laid out by the first earl to rival the towns set up by the London companies throughout Ulster. It represented a highly significant attempt to mimic the work of the formal plantation and represented an attempt by the MacDonnells to capitalise on the political and economic imperatives of the early 17th century, a very important period in Ulster’s history.