In 1990, archaeological excavations along the eastern bank of the River Poddle, in Dublin's south city, uncovered the remains of a post and wattle structure that had once stood at the water's edge. Post and wattle construction, familiar from early Irish building, involves upright timber posts woven through with flexible rods or branches to form a wall or barrier, and here it had been set directly onto the surface of the river silt rather than driven into the ground beneath. The section uncovered measured just over eleven metres in length and stood to a surviving height of around sixty centimetres, a modest fragment of what had been a more substantial intervention along the riverbank.

The structure dates to the thirteenth century, a period when Dublin was expanding rapidly under Anglo-Norman influence and the management of waterways was becoming increasingly important to the city's economy and infrastructure. The Poddle, which rises in Tallaght and flows northward to join the Liffey near Dublin Castle, was at this time a working river, supplying water to mills, fisheries, and the city itself. According to Claire Walsh's 1997 analysis of the excavation findings, the free-standing wattle wall was later replaced by a stone wall, suggesting that the site required increasingly permanent management as pressure on the riverbank grew. The sequence, from organic wattle to mortared stone, mirrors a broader pattern of medieval urban development in which timber solutions were progressively upgraded as towns consolidated.

The Poddle today is largely culverted, flowing beneath roads and buildings for much of its course through the south city, and there is nothing to mark the spot of this particular find above ground. For those interested in the archaeology of Dublin's hidden waterways, the excavation record sits within the broader literature of urban medieval archaeology in Ireland, and Walsh's 1997 report remains the primary reference. The area around the Poddle's historic course can be traced with patience using historical maps, and a handful of points where the river briefly surfaces, including near Dolphin's Barn and in the grounds of St Patrick's Park, give a sense of the watercourse's original character.