House - indeterminate date, Dublin South City, Co. Dublin

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House

House – indeterminate date, Dublin South City, Co. Dublin

Beneath the pavement of one of Dublin's busiest civic thoroughfares, the remains of someone's home lie more or less where they were left, centuries ago.

The building was not grand, it left no written record, and we cannot say with any confidence when it was occupied. What we do know, from excavations carried out in 1994 at the rear of No. 19 Lord Edward Street, is that a habitation level survived in situ, meaning undisturbed in its original position, constructed in the post and wattle technique typical of medieval urban Dublin.

Post and wattle construction involves driving upright timber posts into the ground and weaving flexible rods or branches between them to form walls, which were usually finished with daub, a mixture of mud, straw, and animal dung. It was a practical, widely used method throughout medieval Ireland, and Dublin's waterlogged ground has preserved examples of it far better than drier soils elsewhere might have. The site at Lord Edward Street sits within the boundaries of the medieval walled town, the area enclosed by the Anglo-Norman defences that shaped Dublin from the late twelfth century onward. That this fragment of domestic life survived here at all, given the density of later building and infrastructure, is a matter of fortunate circumstance. The excavation was recorded by Margaret Gowen, whose 1995 report documents the find among a broader survey of archaeological work in the city.

There is nothing to see at the site today in any conventional sense. Lord Edward Street runs between Dublin Castle and Christchurch Cathedral, and the ground underfoot gives no indication of what lies below. For those interested in following the archaeology, the published record in Gowen's 1995 report remains the primary source. The medieval street pattern of the surrounding area is still broadly legible on foot, and Dublinia, the nearby museum dedicated to Viking and medieval Dublin, provides useful context for understanding how ordinary people lived and built within the walled town. The house on Lord Edward Street has no name, no date, and no known occupant, but it once sheltered someone, and the ground quietly held that fact for the excavators to find.

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