Castle - tower house

The National Monuments Service's description

Within the SW quadrant of a cashel (GA113-058001-) that may have subsequently been used as a bawn. In existence in 1574, when it was in the possession of 'Oheyne' (Nolan 1901, 114), this ivy-clad, two-phase, five storey-high, rectangular tower house (L 8.4m, Wth 7.7m) is in fair condition. It is constructed of well-coursed, squared-off stones with dressed quoinstones and it has a base-batter. The first phase (L 3.65m, Wth 7.7m), indicated by vertical jointing in the N and S walls, comprises the E part of the tower containing the spiral stairs and subsidiary chambers. The second phase comprises the main rooms on each floor. The original doorway, set slightly off-centre in the E wall, is largely robbed out. It gives access to a lobby with a murder-hole above. From this lobby, doorways lead to a small chamber in the NE corner, the spiral stairs in the SE corner and the main ground-floor room to the W. There are subsidiary chambers to the E of the main rooms on 1st, 2nd and 3rd floors: the 4th floor occupies the full extent of the tower. Stone vaults exist between 1st/2nd and 3rd/4th floors of the main rooms but the upper vault has almost completely collapsed. There are badly damaged fireplaces on the 2nd and 4th floors in the W wall of the main rooms, and a garderobe on the 3rd floor in the N wall. There is evidence of a concealed chamber in the thickness of the vault between the 3rd/4th floors in the NW corner. Apart from the W gable, little of the roof or parapets remain. However, from the surviving corbels, it is evident that there were angle bartizans at parapet level on the NW and SW corners, and machicolations on the N and E walls: the latter was placed directly above the doorway. The windows generally consist of flat, round and ogee-headed single lights with a number of twin-light ogee-headed examples on the 4th floor. Finally, there are two small opes in the jambs of the doorway and a horizontal slit directly above it. These may have been musket loops or the opes for a yett. (O'Flanagan 1927, Vol. 2, 178, Korff and O'Connell 1985)

Compiled by: Galway Archaeological Survey, UCG

Date of upload: 19 September 2017

References

Korff, A. and O'Connell, J. 1985 Kinvara: a rambler's map and guide. Kinvarra.

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1927 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the county of Galway collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1839. Typescript in 3 vols. Bray.

Nolan, J.P. 1901a Galway castles and owners in 1574. Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society 1, 109-23.