Maison Dieu, Dover

The rare opportunity to excavate within a standing medieval building has produced significant new information concerning its history.

FAU was commissioned to hand excavate the well of a proposed lift shaft within the early 14th-century stone tower that forms part of the present Town Hall of Dover. The tower and the adjoining late 13th-century hall, together known as Maison Dieu, represent later additions to a hospital of that name first established on the site in 1203.

After the removal of 19th-century brickwork and rubble infill, a substantial north-south wall was revealed, constructed of flint with a chalk block core. A second smaller abutting wall of similar construction ran east-west. The western side of the larger wall was faced with shaped flint blocks and appeared to have been an external surface designed to have been viewed, while the eastern face contained some chalk and tile and showed traces of rendering, suggesting perhaps that it had been internal. The western edge of this wall aligned exactly with the sides of two 14th-century masonry piers, while it was evident that three vaulted arches had been blocked subsequent to the original construction of the tower. It is therefore possible that the wall was constructed to externalize an arcaded area to the west and form a room on its eastern side. This covered area was perhaps intended to provide shelter for those awaiting admittance to the hall. If this were the case, the proposed room to the east of the wall may have served as an antechamber opening onto the medieval hall through a surviving archway between the central northern masonry pier of the tower and the west wall of the stair turret.

At its northern end, the wall was keyed into a section of the southern wall of the 13th-century hall, and it was apparent that the ground floor of the tower had originally been built as an outshot to the hall.

Reprinted with permission from UCL Field Archaeology Unit News.