EMAP_Progress_Reports_2009_2.pdf - The Heritage Council

Cork
The following is based on general and thematic papers on Scandinavian Cork and a range of
excavation publications related to the town (e.g. Bradley & Halpin 1993; Cleary, Hurley &
Shee Twohig 1997; Hurley 1998; Cleary & Hurley 2003). It will focus on various aspects of
the town’s layout including its location, defenses, streets and pathways, plots and fences,
structures and evidence for craft and industry.
LOCATION
Fig. 64: Map of Cork city in Pacata Hibernia (after Hurley 2003a, 152).
Cork or Corcaigh meaning ‘Marsh’ is situated in a broad swampy tidal estuary of the River Lee
(Fig. 64). The settlement was built on estuarine islands (South Island and North Island) in the
marshy valley of the Lee which gradually climbed up the steep hills rising to the north and
south. Today the river in Cork city flows through two main channels (the South Channel and
the North Channel) on either side of the South and North Islands. The south bank of the
south channel and the South Island contained the nucleus of the early monastic and Hiberno-
Scandinavian settlement at Cork.
The earliest settlement at Cork was a monastery dedicated to St. Finbarr or Bairre on the
south bank of the south island (Fig. 2). The monastery was probably founded sometime in
the sixth or early seventh centuries and was evidently in existence in A.D. 682 when the obit
of a certain Suibne, abbot of Cork is recorded in the annals. The monastery was under the
control of the local Ua Selbaig family and the Dál Cais in the eleventh century with command
of the settlement and monastery at Cork passing to the Meic Charthaig Kings of Desmond in
the early twelfth century.
Very little is known about the physical appearance of the early monastery at Cork but at least
its position- on a prominent ridge on the south bank of the south channel overlooking the
marshy estuary of the River Lee- can be established. The present cathedral dates to the
nineteenth century though Romanesque fragments in the chapter house indicate the
presence of a pre-Norman church on the site. A description in A.D. 1644 also records the
presence of a possible round tower a short distance east of the cathedral. Based on a series
of plot boundaries, it has been suggested (Bradley and Halpin 1993, 17-18) that the early
monastery was located within a D-shaped enclosure with its northern side formed by the cliff
dropping to the River Lee below.
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