2010:274 - NEW SQUARE, TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN Urban, post-medieval, Dublin

Monitoring took place, confined to six small trenches on the southern side of the north range of New Square, which was laid out in the 1830s. The pits were excavated to facilitate the construction of two wheelchair ramps, which provide access into the building via the original doors. This site is outside the known location of the medieval priory of All Hallows and the subsequent college quadrangle, which lay to the south-west in Parliament Square (Front Square). The work, while very limited in scope, established that the original ground in this location was composed of riverine gravels and clays, probably suggesting that it originally formed part of the sloblands along the southern side of the River Liffey, which were inundated from time to time by the tidal river. This supports the cartographic survey, which indicated that this area was rough ground into the 19th century, bound and drained by a large ditch on the southern side. Also of note was the fact that the ground at New Square block, unlike the eastern end of college, including Botany Bay to the north-west, was not infilled or built up in any way and the building was founded directly on the clays and gravel, with the foundation cut clearly visible, filled with 19th-century brick. This is in contrast to the western end of college, especially around the Provost’s Garden and the Chief Stewart’s House, which was infilled with a distinctive black cultivation soil, 0.4m in depth.