Sinkhole in fashionable part of historic city uncovers massive medieval building

Archaeologists in a historic city recently came across the remnants of an expansive medieval hospital.The discovery was announced by the City of York Council on June 9.The ancient remains were found in a “void,” or sinkhole, that had recently opened on the street of St Leonard’s Place in York in the United Kingdom.“The archaeological find was discovered as work was taking place to repair the sinkhole on St Leonard’s Place,” the council said in a statement.“The void, which is in the middle of the road outside York Theatre Royal, was made safe before contractors and archaeology teams began investigation works.”The find is believed to be the remnants of St.

Leonard’s Hospital — built between the 12th and 13th centuries.Pictures show ancient bricks hiding several inches beneath the street. The hospital was “one of the largest” in Northern England during the Middle Ages, the council said.The property originally stretched from York’s Museum Gardens to the city’s Theatre Royal, the council’s statement noted.After the English Reformation, the area was used as a royal mint – earning the name “Mint Yard.”“Mint Yard [was] demolished several hundred years ago and a road made on top of it,” the statement added.By the 19th century, the city council said, the Mint Yard buildings were “a warren of residencies, yards and stables and were demolished to make way [for] the new Georgian streetscape in 1836, as it became one of the most fashionable parts of the city at the time.”The council added, “The demolished parts of the city walls were then used to create a base for their new road, which we now know as St Leonard’s Place.”Kate Ravilious, a member of the City of York Council, thanked the public for their patience during the archaeological work.“We knew that there is a lot of complex archaeology in the area dating back to the Roman legionary fortress,” Ravilious said in a statement.“Throughout the works, we have been [al...