Document record MAB57653 - ST NICHOLAS HOUSE, ABERDEEN

Site of St Nicholas House, former headquarters of Aberdeen City Council.

Site of St Nicholas House, former headquarters of Aberdeen City Council. Photographic recording was carried out by RCAHMS in 2012 prior to its demolition. A watching brief was carried out by Cameron Archaeology in 2012 on three areas of pits dug for hoardings posts. They contained only 19th and 20th century deposits, mostly connected with the roads, St Nicholas House and the 19th century tenements that had previously occupied the site. No monitoring was made of the Upperkirkgate end of the site which had been disturbed by the underground car park. A trial trenching evaluation was also carried out by Cameron Archaeology in September 2012, on the east side of Provost Skene's House (NJ90NW0014). In one trench wall foundation trenches, probably of the tenements, was recorded. No features or finds were recorded in the other trench, but it showed that there is potential for archaeological deposits to survive in this area. A watching brief was maintained by Cameron Archaeology between 2014 and 2018 during trial pits and topsoil stripping for the Marischal Square development. Engineer's trial trenches dug adjacent to Provost Skene's House (NJ90NW0014) uncovered wall foundations and a stone slab surface. Trenches for service cables between Provost Skene's House and Flourmill Lane found no archaeological features or artefacts. An exploratory trench in October 2016 in Broad Street alongside the development site uncovered a wall, probably of a 19th century tenement, with what was probably an infilled cellar. Excavations around Provost Skene's House in February 2017, showed the least modern disturbance across the development site, but also found no signs of disturbance from the Medieval or post-Medieval periods prior to or after construction of Provost Skene's House. Site visits in February to April 2017 to excavations in advance of pavement replacement around Broad Street and Upperkirkgate recorded no features or artefacts of archaeological significance. Monitoring in February 2018 of excavation of a rectangular sump for a water feature on the Broad Street frontage recorded dressed stone from the 19th century buildings which lined the street, and recovered two pieces of cut animal bone but no archaeological features were identified. The finds from watching briefs in Broad Street included a small number of medieval pottery sherds of mainly 13th -14th century type and East Coast redwares.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2012, ST NICHOLAS HOUSE, ABERDEEN: SOFT STRIP PRIOR TO DEMOLITION EVALUATION AND WATCHING BRIEF, Evaluation and WB report (Bibliographic reference). SAB6972.

ARCHAEOLOGY SCOTLAND, 2014, DISCOVERY AND EXCAVATION IN SCOTLAND, NEW SERIES, VOLUME 14, 2013, p. 11 (Bibliographic reference). SAB5483.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2015, MARISCHAL SQUARE, ABERDEEN; WRITTEN SCHEME OF INVESTIGATION, WSI (Bibliographic reference). SAB7009.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2016, MARISCHAL SQUARE, ABERDEEN; REPORT ON ARCHAEOLOGICAL WATCHING BRIEF , WB report (Bibliographic reference). SAB7008.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2016, REPORT ON AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL WATCHING BRIEF AT KEMPSTONE HILL, STONEHAVEN, WSI (Bibliographic reference). SAB6987.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2017, REPORT ON A WATCHING BRIEF MARISCHAL SQUARE DEVELOPMENT, ABERDEEN CITY, WB report (Bibliographic reference). SAB7007.

CAMERON ARCHAEOLOGY, 2018, MARISCHAL SQUARE, ABERDEEN; REPORT ON ARCHAEOLOGICAL WATCHING BRIEF FOR TRIAL PITS, TRENCHES AND PAVEMENT WORKS, WB report (Bibliographic reference). SAB7006.

ARCHAEOLOGY SCOTLAND, 2019, DISCOVERY AND EXCAVATION IN SCOTLAND, NEW SERIES, VOLUME 19, 2018, p. 8 (Bibliographic reference). SAB6524.

Record last edited

Oct 31 2024 12:38PM