2019:185 - 84 - 87 Prussia Street, Stoneybatter, Dublin 7, Dublin

Test excavations were undertaken at 84 - 87 Prussia Street, Stoneybatter, Dublin 7. The 0.5 hectare development site is located on the west side of Prussia Street, within the angle formed by Prussia Street, Aughrim Street and St. Joseph's Road. The proposed development comprises the demolition of the vacant commercial building and the construction of student accommodation.

A total of 9 test trenches were excavated across the site. Confined space and structural constraints within the existing building limited the number and length of test trenches inside the building. The leased and active nature of the carpark fronting Prussia Street prohibited the excavation of test trenches in this area. Therefore, it was not possible to excavate 12 test trenches as proposed in the agreed Method Statement.

The trenches were excavated with an 8-tonne and 6-tonne digger, utilising a 1.5m-wide flat-bladed bucket. Trenches measured approximately 1.8m in width, and ranged from 15m to 30m in length.

Trenches 1 to 5 were excavated in the carpark or yard outside the north-west end of the vacant commercial building. The carpark sits at different levels, with the higher level at the back or north-west extent of the site. The ground slopes gradually to the south-east, to the floor level inside the building. Trenches 6 to 9 were excavated inside the vacant building, which is of steel frame construction. Structural girders and existing internal walls dictated the placement and length of the four internal trenches. The natural, a light brown clay,was consistent throughout the site.

As well as archaeological test trenches a number of geotechnical slit trenches, bore-holes and test pits were also excavated and monitored. Geotechnical monitoring results were consistent with the results of the archaeological test excavation.

Supported by the nature of the remains and the finds across the site, the deposits and features exposed most likely relate to late 19th- and/or early 20th-century buildings shown on the c. 1912 and c. 1940s Ordnance Survey maps. Finds from the site consisted of ceramic, clay pipe, animal bone and glass.

A specialised brick (upper surface of which was moulded into two raised squares with bevelled edges) of a dark bluish-purple colour, exposed in Trenches 2, 3 and 4 (and ST02), are marked ‘E. PARRY, BUCKLEY’. This was a firm founded in 1860, with Buckley, in Flintshire, being a prominent brick- and pottery-making town. The company existed until 1960. The remains include cobble stone, grooved concrete and brick floor or yard surfaces, which would have provided an easily drained, non-slip surface for a cattle yard or cattle related activities. Given the location of the Dublin Cattle Market, which operated from a large site to the north of St. Joseph's Road, between Aughrim Street and Prussia Street, from 1863 to 1973, there is a strong likelihood that the site at 84 - 87 Prussia Street was utilised for activities directly related to the Cattle Market. An upstanding feature that supports a cattle -related usage is a row of white painted concrete feeding troughs lining the north-east boundary wall of the development site

The remains at 84 - 87 Prussia Street, although of modern date, are related to a type of industrial site of which there has been little archaeological investigation and research. The site type is also a limited resource, particularly as the site of the formal market, which played a significant role in the social and economic history of Prussia Street and the surrounding area for over one hundred years, was developed post-1973 in the absence of any archaeological record.

It was concluded that the site at 84 - 87 Prussia Street merits further archaeological mitigation.

Unit 39a, Hebron Business Park, Hebron Road, Kilkenny