The sink hole (top) and College Green, Dublin in 1707, including sedan chair
The six-feet-deep sink hole at the George’s Street junction of Dame Street, around 100 metres from the Olympia Theatre “might be part of a long-rumoured tunnel used by 19th century politicians to go to brothels,” according to The Herald.
Splutter!
Also: Hmm.
Sibling of Daedalus writes:
Possibly they got the century wrong, as the Act of Union closed down the Irish Parliament in 1801, bringing an end to the profitable Temple Bar brothel quarter.
This aside, I haven’t been able to locate any reference to such tunnels in contemporaneous historical works, and perhaps there was no need for them, as enclosed sedan chairs provided an equally discreet way for 18th century gentlemen to go about their romantic business.
There’s another network of tunnels under Dame Street, though; the underground Poddle river tunnel network, running from Ship Street past the Olympia, under the Central Bank and out into the Liffey through the big grate below the Clarence Hotel on Wellington Quay.
The hole in Dame Street must be very close to the Poddle network. Or perhaps it is simply, as Dublin City Council has said, a cellar? Incidentally, there was once a well-documented underground tunnel leading from Harcourt Street to the Iveagh Gardens; it may even be still there, although the Luas works on Harcourt Street didn’t manage to turn up any trace of it…
Anyone?
College Green illustration via: Come Here To Me
Top pic: Adam Sherry
wait, this wasn’t an april fools?
The harcourt street tunnel is still there – it runs from Conradh na Gaeilge
Its a cellar. Full stop. Nothing to see here! A cellar!
‘six feet’?
Are we not a metric country?
Also ‘six feet’??
April Fool?
Tell it like it is Sib
am i the only one who notices that there’s a grill thingy right next to the hole and that the tarmac around it looks like it’s been done at a different date from the rest of the road? Shoddy workmanship, anyone?
Is there no modern technology that we can use to find these tunnels from the surface? Like sonar?
Yes but you need a reason to find them and someone to pay for it.
Time team use geo-psysics for such things. Between cellars, rivers, old sewers, pipeworks form various utilities, the odd dead viking, Dublin streets are swiss cheese.
I like it how you equate whoring and romantic business, a true modern man.
a mouse likes a well-used hole
amazing the lengths some folk go to to get their hole
You haven’t read any of of Mani’s posts, have you?
never heard of her
Amateur historians – always at the Wikipedia and full of ifs buts and maybes.
it’s a garda training exercise. it teaches them to knowt the difference between their @rses and a hole in the ground..
I’m fairly certain I read about tunnels like these in Terry Fagan’s book on the Monto