Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland
Castle - motte and bailey
Donode Big, County Kildare, Ireland
The record
- Townland
- Donode Big
- County
- Kildare
- Country
- Ireland
- First-edition OS map
- Hachured
- Latest-edition OS map
- The Moat
- Coordinates
- 53.15940, -6.62678
- SMR number
- KD024-026----
Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.
David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries
4 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1790 map "Composite: Ireland." (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).
Historical maps covering this location
- 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
- 1799 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
- 1830 · V.3:11-15:XV. Britisches Reich. C. Kon: Ireland. a. Prov: Leinster. Counties: 1-12 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
- 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗
The National Monuments Service's description
A Recorded Historical Monument (HMO 3473). At the SSW end of an extensively quarried N-S ridge. According to Tickell (1960, 368 (Fn. 9), Sir Roland FitzEustace, who died in 1486, possessed, inter alia, a castle at Donode. The site of the castle is now called ‘the moat, a rath some 70 feet high’. A natural hillock appears to have been scarped into an oval shaped area (c. 100m E-W; c. 70m N-S) and the base enclosed by a substantial counter-scarp bank (H. 4.5m) and internal fosse. The interior was divided slightly unequally by deep N-S fosse (Wth. 2m, D. 3.2m), with a tall, steep-sided motte to the W (H. of motte over base of fosse c. 11.5m; upper surface c. 23m N-S; c. 20m E-W), and a lower, slightly smaller bailey to the E (upper surface 19m E-W; 17m N-S). The summit of the motte is very uneven and appears to have been partially dug out. The bailey’s defences are augmented by a fosse and outer bank girdling the upper surface N-E-S. The monument is eroded along the S by a combination of soil creep and animal grazing, and a pit containing charcoal and burnt and unburnt bone is visible in an eroded area on the N face of the bailey, possibly a habitation layer. (CUCAP AHK 25 (1963); APH 94 (1966))
Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy
Date of upload: 14 June 2012
Nearby in the register
- Enclosureunder 1 mi
- Enclosure - large enclosureunder 1 mi
- Habitation siteunder 1 mi
- Ring-ditchunder 1 mi
Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.