2014:603 - 14-17 Moore Street, Dublin, Dublin

An assessment was carried out at nos 14-17 Moore Street/8-9 Moore Lane and at Nos 6-7 Moore Lane. The on-site works were carried out between January and March of 2014. The report also includes detailed descriptions of the out-buildings, cellars and other structures in the rear plots.

In general, the testing established the houses (nos 14-17) were built within a much larger disused brick quarry and are founded directly on natural gravels. This brickfield is marked on John Rocque’s map of Dublin, dated 1756 and is annotated as ‘old’ suggesting that the brickfield was defunct by this date probably making the land less attractive to developers at this time. But the quarry pit was put to some use as it was used as a dump for the domestic refuse of the city in the 18th century, the rubbish tipped into the area to build up the ground level. These deposits were very consistent across the plot and comprised friable brown organic deposits, containing animal bone, shell, charcoal and cinders to over 2m in depth.

The investigation found that the houses were constructed through the organic fill but that the infill houses and walls to the rear sat on the organic deposits. Thus, the rear plots contain deep deposits of organic waste. The test-pits within the four houses (Nos 14-17) were designed to ascertain the nature and extent of their foundations, which were found to be very insubstantial and shallow, in some cases extending to less than 0.2m in depth. The test-pits also sought to establish whether or not there were floor levels surviving within the basements of the houses but only one very broken slab was found in No. 14 while the rest of the basements were found to have modern concrete floors.

Test-pits were also excavated to the rear (east) of the houses within the property plots and these located the remains of the original garden/boundary wall between Nos 15 and 16 and the remains of the west wall of a dogleg limestone industrial building (Nos 6-9 Moore Lane), the envelope of which still stands at the eastern end of the plot of No. 16. A substantial 4-bayed cellar was found in this location, divided into two large chambers. Other features found included part of a garden path but unfortunately no definitive ground surface could be identified within any of the yards as successive layers of concrete have been laid over the years, directly over the organic deposits. As a result, it was impossible to establish a consistent level across the plots, which could be related to the 1916 period.

Testing was also carried out in the two-story infill house (F13) to the rear of No. 14 which was founded on fill and to the rear of No. 13 where two underground intact brick coal cellars were found which could be linked with part of a standing gable. Further work is proposed at this site when the stabilization works get underway in Nos 14-17 Moore Street.

28 Cabinteely Close, Cabinteely, Dublin 18