Viking structures found behind Four Courts

Doozie

I thought people might have been interested in this find. Mags Gowen is digging behind the Four Courts at the moment and this house seems to have been well preserved, possibly dating to the eleventh century, not far from the Stoneybatter settlement the Vikings were apparently banished to.

This is a blog which contains a podcast with an interview with Mags Gowen and link to the news report detailing the discovery.

http://www.seandalaiocht.com/1/post/2010/01/viking-house-on-the-northside-of-the-liffey.html

Doozie

and a press release from yesterday:





Press Release 28th January, 2010

Viking Discovery at Hammond Lane.

Archaeologists excavating a site at Hammond Lane, Church Street on Dublin’s north side have discovered the remains of a classic Viking House. The house is the first complete plan of this type of house to have been discovered on the north side of the River Liffey and dates to the late Viking Age, immediately prior to the Anglo Norman invasion.

The Dublin City Archaeologist, Ruth Johnson said “I am very excited to see this house and the features associated with it that survive at Church Street. This find will undoubtedly attract great interest from international Viking scholars and it raises many new questions about the settlement here. There is a popular myth that all the important archaeology of Dublin has been dug, but this find illustrates the importance of careful planning and development in the city.”

For Further information please contact:
Dublin City Council Press Office: (01) 2222170/086 8150010
or Ruth Johnson, City Archaeologist, (01) 2222780

Medievalist

Didn't listen to the whole podcast, but they found a smaller Viking-age wattle structure on the same site in 2005. I'd love to see how the two structures relate in plan and context. It's very exciting news!

Smartypantsdig

The whole concept of Dublin being just the bit between the walls is up for debate big time now. I was on a dig in the south of the city where we found Type 1 HN dwellings on the south bank of the Coomb stream. There appears to have been a thriving hinterland out side the walled town.

boneless

Smartypantsdig wrote: »

The whole concept of Dublin being just the bit between the walls is up for debate big time now. I was on a dig in the south of the city where we found Type 1 HN dwellings on the south bank of the Coomb stream. There appears to have been a thriving hinterland out side the walled town.

That site has been published in the last 'Medieval Dublin' volume. I saw the presentation at the FOMD Symposium last year. It was a great find.

Smartypantsdig

This years Friends of Medieval Dublin lectures will feature the house from Hammond Lane I believe. Has anyone here got the details of when they are on yet?

uncle ernie

there ya go!

Friends of Medieval Dublin
12th Medieval Dublin Symposium


Saturday 22 May 2010, Robert Emmet Theatre (Room 2037)

Arts Building, Trinity College Dublin


09.30 Registration and opening remarks
Seán Duffy

09.45 Recent excavations of a Viking burial at the War Memorial Gardens, Islandbridge
Maeve Sikora

10. 30 The pencillings and antiquarian rambles of a Fingalian: John S. Sloane and the Victorian historiography of medieval Dublin
Stuart Kinsella

11.10 Tea & coffee

11.30 Printing in Dublin - the first 60 years
Dermot McGuinne

12.10 The kings of Dublin and the kings of Leinster
Clare Downham

12.45 Lunch

14.00 The Early Medieval Archaeology Project (EMAP): some observations on early medieval archaeological excavations in the Dublin region, 1930-2009

Lorcan Harney, Jonathan Kinsella, Aidan O’Sullivan

14.45 The Dominicans and medieval Dublin – the sources re-examined
Bernadette Williams

15.20 Tea & coffee

15. 40 The Norsesiders – excavations of a Viking house at Hammond Lane Phase 3
Colm Moriarty

16.15 Public viewing of DVD Medieval Dublin - From Vikings to Tudors: Volume II
Niall Ó hOisín and Breffni O’Malley



Admission Free: All Welcome

For further information, contact Dr Seán Duffy

E sduffy@tcd.ie; T (01) 896 1368

Doozie

http://www.opw.ie/en/LatestNews/Title,12671,en.html

This is getting exciting....