Palaeo-environmental Study Area P21 Harbour, South Coast, Republic of

PALAEO-ENVIRONMENTAL STUDY AREA P21

WATERFORD HARBOUR, SOUTH COAST,

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE HISTORY OF HUMAN SETTLEMENT AND COASTAL CHANGE AT WATERFORD HARBOUR, , EIRE

The experience gained in the Shannon Estuary shows that the intertidal shoreline of Waterford Harbour is in need of archaeological survey. Present archaeological knowledge of the harbour is very largely confined to extant sites in the on-shore zone and this is conveyed in the distribution map compiled from the inventory of the Discovery Programme (Figure P21.1). Archaeological knowledge of the region has also been assisted by the Ballyclough Project of 1983 which investigated Neolithic settlement in the catchment of the harbour and its tributary rivers, the Barrow and Suir. A brief intertidal appraisal has been carried out by the Discovery Programme and submerged peats and land surfaces have been identified at the southern end of the harbour.

It seems that the origins of maritime activity in the environs of Waterford Harbour can probably be attributed to the Neolithic period. On the adjacent uplands, in the vicinity of Tramore, a distinctive group of Neolithic chamber tombs has been identified (Daniel 1950 & 1958). The architecture of this select group of modest burial mounds conforms with the definition of ‘entrance graves’ and it seems to show very little affinity with any of the other megalithic tombs which abound in Ireland. There is, however, a notable similarity between the Tramore entrance graves and an isolated group of simple stone-built tombs found in the Isles of Scilly. This similarity has led to the suggestion of a maritime link between the two communities and the term Scilly-Tramore has been applied in recognition of this supposed connection (Daniel, ibid.). This hypothesis would certainly be compatible with an active Neolithic seafaring community thriving upon the resources of Waterford Harbour. The case for such seafaring activity has been further strengthened by the finding of an exotic faience bead in a secondary context in one of the Tramore entrance graves, at Harristown. The distribution of these primitive glass beads is highly restricted in Early Bronze Age Europe and it is not fully understood (Newton & Renfrew, 1970; McKerrell, 1973) but it may not be without significance that another example has been found in the Isle of Scilly, in the entrance grave at Knackyboy Cairn (O’ Neil, 1952).

The documented history of maritime activity in Waterford Harbour can be traced to Viking settlement at the navigable head of the Suir river. This is a history which is held in common with kindred Viking maritime settlements at Dublin, Wicklow, Wexford, Cork and Limerick. The Vikings enforced their presence in a nebula of key trading locations reaching as far as Aquitaine to Ireland and Iceland to Novgorod. Where archaeological investigations have proceeded at Viking waterfront sites such as Dublin, York and Novgorod, the concealed cultural heritage has proved to be spectacularly rich in its artistic, epigraphic, and social content. This endows all of these sites with an outstanding rank in terms of European cultural importance. It is important to observe, however, that, with the notable exception of Novgorod, these investigations have been relatively small and opportune; their raisonne d’etre largely arising from a need for intervention or mitigation in the path of new building work and the need for development.

A further feature of these investigations into Viking coastal settlement has been their virtual restriction to the terrestrial and intertidal zones. At Dublin and York, waterside settlement has been discovered deep below present ground level in locations where post-medieval urban expansion has carried the

city on to reclaimed intertidal land. Discoveries of Viking ships the sub-tidal zone in such natural

1 Palaeo-environmental Study Area P21 Waterford Harbour, South Coast, Republic of Ireland harbours as Roskildefijorde in Denmark are a poignant reminder that Waterford Harbour and its kindred havens on the Irish coast carry a particularly high archaeological potential for the preservation of cultural remains of this period. All of these natural harbours deserve particular safeguards from such unsustainable processes as navigational dredging, trawling and trophy diving

At the mouth of Waterford Harbour, the Hook peninsular and its neighbouring townlands has received recent attention in a desk-top study of its physical characteristics and its past and present human geography (Colfer, 1997). The peninsular is now heavily dedicated to arable land-use yet the regular ploughing of the soil does not seem to have resulted in the exposure or recognition of many archaeological sites other than those of the historic period which are upstanding and readily recognisable (Colfer, ibid, fig 6). At first glance this evidence seems to suggest a history of sparse human occupation, yet a study of the coastal place-names presents a very different picture. In this we see a rich array of specifically named localities concentrated along almost the entire coastline of the Hook Colfer, 1997, 273, fig. 20).

A study of past maritime activity in and around the mouth of the natural harbour also reveals a lost pattern of human coastal subsistence. A successful fishing industry can be suspected in the mid 15th century when a stone tower house was built to defend the community of Slade which was sited at the head of a tiny sheltered inlet on the east side of the Hook peninsular. Similarly, another sheltered creek in neighbouring Bannow Bay was successfully colonised by a community of Cistercian monks who, from the early 13th century onwards, were responsible for the development of a successful creek-head abbey which they named ‘Tintern’ after their mother house in Monmouthshire. The Cistercians were noted for their interests and investments in maritime activity and the siting of this monastery in many ways reflects the Cistercian abbey which we have already noted on the Isle of Wight coast at Quarr. The Augustinian Order was prompt the grasp a similar opportunity when obtaining an appropriate coastal site for a priory in the neighbouring townland of Clonmines. Before the close of the 13th century maritime traffic in the mouth of the harbour had become sufficiently intense to warrant the building of a lighthouse at the tip of the Hook pensinsular. This was a tall and substantial stone building which was still standing at the close of the 17th century.

A chart of Waterford Harbour prepared in AD 1591 by Francis Jobson shows a coastline well populated with medieval churches and this seems to reflect a prosperity which may owe much to the fish resources of the inlet as to the products of the adjacent farmland. In recent historic times men still rowed long distances in small boats to set lobster pots made of from willow saplings and to fish ‘marked’ spots where good fishing had been traditionally recognised in the environs of the harbour (Colfer, 1997, 272, fig. 19) . Mackerel and pollock were caught or trapped in the intertidal zone by those who did not have boats but were adept in the use of lures made of goat hair and goat skin. This was autumn practice which allowed the drying and salting of fish for winter consumption. At low tide, the sea shore was also a source of crabs, barnachs and piothans (limpets and periwinkles). In early summer the sea shore also yielded another type of harvest when seaweed known as woar was collected and carried to the fields where is was spread as a fertiliser (Colfer, ibid). In the late 17th century a short-lived saltworks was operated at Slade when the harbour was improved at a the time when communities on the Irish coast were grasping the opportunities offered by the Newfoundland trade.

In the 18th century, Waterford was a major port with extensive maritime links ranging from Iberia to Newfoundland. The city drew its wealth from a tripartite hinterland which was based on the rich pastoral valleys of the rivers Barrow, Nore and Suir. These rivers fed a drowned inlet or ‘harbour’ which had become alive with shipping. Cargoes of many nationalities were wheeled across the city’s long stone waterfront while a train of tall arcaded mercantile buildings overlooked this scene. This history of growing prosperity claimed its origins in the 17th century when the traditional pattern of dairy-farming began to respond to increased demands for beef which might be exported through the city of Waterford. The growth of this export market had two particular impacts on the region. A

2 Palaeo-environmental Study Area P21 Waterford Harbour, South Coast, Republic of Ireland

proliferation of bullock herds brought desolation to many traditional tillage-based village communities where land boundaries were redrawn to accommodate new entrpreneurial cattle estates. The prosperity of the ‘grazing baronies’ was also responsible for an intensification of urban population in the city of Waterford where competition for waterfrontage on the navigable began to grow. These urban pressures for flood plain development continued with the expansion of the city in the 19th and 20th centuries. Land reclamation was also carried out on some margins of the natural harbour, notably in the townland of Kilmokea where the east channel of the was drained to secure the annexation of Great Island.

Until a coastal change chronology is established for Waterford Harbour and its tidal tributaries its future response to rising sea level cannot be adequately assessed. Carter (1991-4) identifies this area as sensitive to sea-level rise, observing that the river estuary leading up to Waterford city appears to be vulnerable. At the Augustinian priory at Clonmines there seems reason to suspect that part of the medieval structure may have succumbed to submergence since the 13th century. This may be one of a number of coastal archaeological sites which can offer a potential measurement of the progress coastal erosion and the timescale of sea-level rise. The presence of submerged prehistoric land surfaces within the harbour deserves further attention and this will require survey of the intertidal zone and prospection of the sub-tidal zone. Such investigations might also consider the need to identify and protect historic wooden shipwrecks which may be totally concealed below the present floor of the harbour and the Suir river.

For the purpose of this LIFE study, Waterford Harbour should be viewed as a case for further study. In the light of the experience gained in the Shannon estuary, the cultural and palaeo- environmental resources of the harbour can be seen as dual environmental assets both deservous of scientific evaluation, protection and sustainable management. The potential cultural value for the Viking period is particularly important yet the need to identify this concealed resource may be no less than the need to recognise those sediment archives which may resolve uncertainties regarding future flooding and erosion in the estuary. Carter (1991-4) has observed that the growth of saltmarsh in equilibrium with a rising sea might possibly buffer the effects of sea-level rise on some sensitive areas of the Waterford coast. Drawing upon the experience gained through LIFE study of the Solent region it may be appropriate to consider a precautionary approach in this instance. In the case of the Solent, the depletion of protective saltmarshes has been equated with the accidental introduction of an alien form of Spartina grass and an increase in shipping activity and pollution. Monitoring of both the natural and historic environments of the intertidal zone of Waterford Harbour should offer a means of recognising early indicators of impending changes in the coastline.

BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR OBSERVATIONS ON THE INLET AND HARBOUR OF WATERFORD

Aalen, F. H. A., 1997. ‘Irish rural landscape; synthesis of habitat and history’ in F. H. A. Aalen, K. Whelan & M. Stout, (eds.), Atlas of the Irish rural landscape. Cork University Press. Carter R. W. G., 1987. `Mans’ response to change in the coastal zone of Ireland’, Resource management and optimisation, 127-164. Carter, R. W. G. Devoy, R. J. N. & Shaw, J., 1989. ‘Late Holocene sea-levels in Ireland’. Journal of Quaternary Science 4, 7-24. Carter, R. W .G. 1991-4. ‘Sea-level changes’ in B. E. McWilliams (ed.), Climate change; studies on the implications for Ireland. Government of Ireland, Department of the Environment. Dublin. 1st and 2nd editions. Cunnane, C. & Regan S., 1991-4. ‘Hydrology and freshwater sources’, in B. E. McWilliams, (ed.), Climate change; studies on the implications for Ireland. Government of Ireland, Department of the Environment. Dublin. Flemming, N. C., 1982. ‘Multiple regression analysis of earth movements and eustatic sea-level changes in the United Kingdom during the past 9,000 years, Proceedings of the Geologists Association 93, 113-125. London.

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Foote, P. G. & Wilson D. M., 1970. The Viking achievement. London. Hickey, K., 1990. Historical climatology of flooding in Cork city 1841-1988. Unpub. M.A. thesis. University College of Cork. McWilliams, B. E., 1994. ‘Executive summary’ in B. E. M. McWilliams (ed.), Climate change; the implications for Ireland. Government of Ireland, Department of the Environment. Dublin. Pugh, D.T., 1982. ‘A comparison of recent and historic tides and mean sea-levels off Ireland’, Geophysical Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society 71, 809-815. Shennan I., 1989. ‘Holocene crustal movements and sea-level changes in Great Britain’ Journal of Quaternary Science 4, 77-89.

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