2011:223 - MALAHIDE, Dublin

Monitoring of excavations associated with the laying of a water main for a distance of 1.1km through the grounds of Malahide Castle (DU012-030) and Demesne, Fingal, Co. Dublin, commenced on 5 October 2011. These groundworks were part of a scheme to upgrade and renovate the castle, together with its associated outbuildings and services.
The pipe trench ran from Dublin Road, on the western side of the grounds, following an existing tarmac footpath through wooded gardens to the vicinity of the castle. Here it continued through a grassed area, some 150m from the front of the castle, to near the south-west corner of the main car park. After crossing the park road here, the pipeline ran eastwards across playing fields up to a block of changing rooms. From there it ran in a south-easterly direction across a secondary car park, terminating at Back Road. A fifth section of pipe trench, which ran just south-east of the pathway to the castle entrance in a north-westerly direction, was excavated to carry a spur of the water main up to the south-eastern side of the castle. The pipe trench was up to 1m wide and between 1.2m and 2m in depth. Where the trench crossed grassed areas, a 4m-wide strip of ground was de-sodded prior to its excavation.
The area monitored had been subjected to both garden landscaping in the 18th century and modern landscaping associated with the creation of sports facilities. Despite this, stretches of trench with undisturbed subsoil did occur in places, indicating that the area still retains an archaeological potential.
Features of apparent post-medieval date were identified in two stretches of the pipe trench. Trench A ran from the public gate at the Dublin Road on the western side of the demesne up to a point just beyond Yourell’s Well, a total distance of 350m. The trench was 0.8m wide and up to 1.4m deep, following, for the most part, the route of the Dublin Drive, formerly the main access route from this side of the park. A stone culvert was identified running north to south across the base of the trench, 0.9m below the surface. This appeared to be sealed by the path foundation levels in the upper part of the trench. It was 0.5m wide and 0.6m deep and, since it had a quantity of water in it, appeared to be still functional. It was constructed with two neatly coursed walls of limestone and was capped by two large limestone flags. One of these was displaced by the machine but, since the feature was largely below the foundation level of the trench, the capstone was replaced and the culvert protected with plastic sheeting prior to the laying of the water main.
Trench B was a section of the water-main trench that ran from just south of Yourell’s Well and across the parkland to the south of the castle, up to the current access road near the south-west corner of the main car park. Two short lengths of unmortared limestone walling were identified running obliquely into the trench and meeting at right angles towards the southern baulk. The external face of the section to the west, running north-west to south-east, was 4.4m in length, while the eastern part, running south-west to north-east, had an external length of 4.7m. The internal lengths were 2.9m and 3.4m respectively. Both sections of wall were 0.7m wide and continued beyond the limits of the northern edge of the trench. The walls were only one course high and did not exceed a total height of 0.2m. They were constructed from two lines of roughly faced limestone blocks, up to 0.58m in diameter, forming the external and internal faces of the walls, filled in with pieces of limestone rubble. The walls had no foundation and the triangular area that they enclosed within the trench was composed of grey-brown loamy topsoil with occasional charcoal flecks, with no sign of a built surface. It is likely that this feature represented the junction of two garden walls.
Immediately east of these wall sections was a thin spread of small stones and gravel forming a delicate yet distinct metalled surface. This extended across the whole width of the trench for a distance of 10m and was investigated by means of two sondages. It was composed of light gravel with some occasional small pebbles scattered within it and was only 0.01m thick. It occurred around 0.1–0.14m below the ground surface and the overlying topsoil broke off cleanly at the interface with it. A number of finds were associated with this surface, including animal bones, pottery sherds, a clay pipe bowl and a small milled copper coin with a harp surmounted by a crown just visible on the reverse side. The clay pipe bowl and some of the pottery appear to be 18th-century in date, while the harp and crown motif was a common motif on coinage from the 17th to the 19th century. It is not clear what this surface represents but it may be the last remnants of a pathway.
The only features of interest found during the monitoring of these works to date were post-medieval and seem to date from the 18th century at the earliest. The stone culvert in Trench A is probably 19th-century in date and no early traces of the western approach to the castle were found here. The walls and surface in Trench B were probably garden features and appear to be 18th-century in date. Monitoring of groundworks is ongoing at the site.

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