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Excavation
Date February 2006 - September 2006
Event ID 550008
Category Recording
Type Excavation
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/550008
NS 602 655 Four periods of work required monitoring and recording at Glasgow Cathedral between February and September 2006. As part of a staged survey of the external elevations, the E elevation was drawn, photographed and recorded. The work was intended to complete existing survey data and to identify significant archaeological features. To this end, all relevant alterations and repairs to the monument, both historical and recent, as well as records of original architectural details, were completed.
Flooring slabs were removed in three separate areas on the northern and southern side of the lower church. The slabs were lifted to assess the thickness of the slabs and the underlying ground conditions and also to allow cables to be laid to provide power to the lights on the handrails. At the base of each of three sets of stairs, secure fixing points were required to bed the handrails and where possible small foundation pads were to be excavated to accommodate these.
The first trench was on the northern side of the lower church at the foot of the steps from leading from the treasury. This area was of particular interest as most of the area concerned had not been disturbed. In this trench a possible grave marker with an E-W alignment was seen. The slabs in the other two trenches (at the NE corner of the lower church at the base of the stairs near the chapter house, and at the SE corner of the lower church) clearly had been lifted and re-set during the excavation and installation of the heating system in the 1990s.
We recorded a gargoyle and its setting after its removal from the SE corner of the cathedral. The gargoyle was carved from blond sandstone, now so heavily weathered that its form was unrecognisable.
Finally, paving slabs and cobbles outside the W and S doors were removed. A subsequent, shallow excavation in the area beneath the cobbles near the S door was monitored. Nothing of archaeological significance was noted and no finds were retained.
Archive to be deposited in NMRS.
Sponsor: Historic Scotland.
A Mackintosh and C Shaw 2006