Archaeology Notes

Event ID 744860

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/744860

NT27SE 4335 2653 7379

NT 2653 7379 A watching brief was carried out in February 1998 at the site for the new Scottish Poetry Library, situated 25m S of Canongate between Carfrae's Entry on the W and Bull's Close to the E. The site was excavated to a depth of 3m below ground surface into natural bedrock.

The area was enclosed to the E and N by two upstanding post-medieval mortar-bonded walls of rubble construction, for a N-S orientated rectangular building (21 x 7.5m) facing onto Carfrae's Entry. The structure's partially demolished W wall was recorded 0.6m to the W of the N wall, at a depth of 0.55m below the modern ground surface. No archaeological deposits survived within the internal area of the building, with modern demolition rubble overlying bedrock.

The W wall truncated a late medieval rubbish pit, which contained a mixed assemblage of animal bone and 15th-century pottery. The remains of an unlined circular well (diameter 1.55m) were located 6.6m S and 2m W of the northern end of the above building, locating it within Carfrae's Entry. The well was probably reused as a cess pit in the post-medieval period, with the upper fills containing a small assemblage of 16th/17th-century midden material associated with mats of organic (primarily plant) material.

Sponsor: City of Edinburgh Council.

J A Lawson 1999