Quay in Irishtown,limerick City,priorsland (saint Michael's Par.)

In 1981 excavations carried out in advance of commercial development at Charlotte's Quay uncovered 'substantial remains of the fourteenth/ fifteenth-century town walls together with the foundations of the West Watergate' (Lynch 184, 1). Charlotte's Quay was described by Lynch (1984, 281) as an 'area outside the town walls remained largely undeveloped during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries with the exception of a quay wall built parallel with the town wall sometime in the seventeenth century. A quantity of post-medieval pottery was found on the site. The town walls were demolished in the late eighteenth century and at the same time a complex series of brick foundation arches were built to support Charlotte's Quay. The construction of this quay facilitated the reclamation of the site and its use for housing and industrial development' (Lynch 1984, 281). Lynch (ibid. 286) described the area where the 17th century quay wall was uncovered as 'immediately west of West Watergate, outside the town walls, was a marshy wasteland up until the eighteenth century. Phillips's sketch of 1685 shows a few scattered cabins in this area, but building on an organised scale did not take place until 1717 when 'Messrs Vincent, Wight and Holland took a lease of it from the Corporation and made a quay, which was called Mardyke' (Ferrar 1787,1 26). The 17th century quay wall uncovered in the 1981 excavations were described by Lynch (1984, 291-2) as following; 'No evidence was recovered of a moat or ditch outside the town wall [LI005-017010-] in spite of Speed's detailed illustration of a water-filled moat surrounding Irish Town. There is some evidence, however, of a water-filled channel having been contained between the town wall and an outer retaining or quay wall, which led from the Abbey River up to the northern tower of the West Watergate. The precise date of construction and use of this channel is not clear and it is not depicted in any of the known maps of Limerick. The map of c. 1600 shows the river bank lying half-way between the West Watergate and the corner of the town wall which must have been standing in the river itself. In the Phillips map of 1685 there is a suggestion of a low-lying marshy area leading from the river's edge up to the West Watergate. The 1691 map shows the whole of Irish Town surrounded by a double rampart and moat system, but this was obviously a depiction of the desired (or possibly planned) fortifications at the time of the Williamite sieges, rather than reality. The map of c. 1750-61 shows a river inlet extending almost to the West Watergate and a similar situation is depicted on the plan for the construction of Charlotte's Quay c. 1759. The purpose of building such a retaining or quay wall must have been to partially divert and contain the Abbey River and to provide access for small boats to the vicinity of the West Watergate. It is probable that this development took place sometime in the seventeenth century judging by the masonry of the wall and the range of finds recovered from the primary deposit in the channel. The surviving stretch of quay wall is 32.50m long, averages 0.95m wide and has a maximum height of 3.20m. It runs southward from under the present roadway at Charlotte's Quay, roughly parallel to the town wall and on average 7.20m distant from it, to within c. 5.0m of the northern tower of the West Watergate. Unfortunately its southern end has been broken through in modern times, which means that a reconstruction of the landing or off-loading area adjacent to the Watergate is impossible. The method of construction of the quay wall is similar to that of the town wall, i.e. a core of mortared rubble faced with limestone blocks. The vertical east face was fully exposed and displays two distinct phases of construction. The lower 2m (approx.) consists of limestone ashlars (averaging 0.60m X 0.20m) closely set in distinct or regular courses. Surface dressing of the ashlars is minimal. The majority display simple hammer-dressing, while approximately seven have chisel-draughted margins (sensu Moxley 1964) enclosing a sparrow-picked surface. A rectangular opening (0.68m X 0.64m) just above the bottom course was located c. 3.30m south of the angle in the wall. This feature, which must have acted as a drainage inlet/outlet, has a flattened arch with widely splayed voussoirs on each side of the keystone and had at some stage been blocked up with brick from the western side. The quay wall was either heightened or had the facing renewed on its upper levels at some stage in the late seventeenth or eighteenth centuries. The masonry here is quite distinct from that of the lower levels in that the limestone blocks are, on average, much smaller (c. 0.40m X 0.20m) and the courses are less well-defined with many smaller stones used to fill the interstices. A series of seven putlocks (on average 2.50m apart) occurs along the dividing line between both phases of construction and is associated with the upper or secondary levels. As with the town walls, the upper portion of the quay wall was incorporated in the foundation courses of nineteenth-century basements and various buildings fronting onto Charlotte's Quay. A complex of eighteenth/nineteenth-century structures abutted the quay wall on its western side. These included the red-brick relieving arches built when Charlotte's Quay was first constructed'. Compiled and revised by: Caimin O'Brien Date of revised upload: 28 November 2019