Water mill - vertical-wheeled

The National Monuments Service's description

Carrigan (1905, vol. 4, 54) refers to a grant of 1346 of the, ‘Barony and Lordship of Kenlis, which belonged to Eustace le Poer, are granted by the King to [Lord] Walter de Bermingham’, which includes the manor of Kells, including one water mill. Empey (1984, 37) suggests that, ‘There can be little doubt that the castle mill occupied the site of the present mill about 100 meters north-east of the motte’. This mill could be the water mill, or a least at the location, depicted in a late 18th-century sketch by Vallancy, copied by Beranger (Harbison 1991, 86 and opposite). It is shown as a simple single-storey thatched building, viewed from the W, with a large off-centre door, a small window at eaves level at the mill-wheel end to the S and a possible second window at the opposite end, though this is obscured by a hill (ibid.). A flour mill is shown at this location on the 1st (1839) ed. OS 6-inch map and it is annotated as a ‘Corn Mill’ on the 1948 revision. The present mill occupying the site is that shown on the OS maps and consists of a three-storey four-bay limestone rubble building with a slated roof and mill-wheel on the S gable. Across the mill race, to the S, is a two-story two-bay miller’s house, also of limestone rubble and slated roof.

See attached:
KK027-029014-_01 From Harbison 1991, opposite 86 - a late 18th-century sketch by Vallancy, copied by Beranger

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 12 June 2023

References

Carrigan, Rev. W. 1905 (Reprint 1981) The history and antiquities of the diocese of Ossory, 4 vols. Kilkenny. Roberts Books and Wellbrook Press.

Harbison, P. 1991 Beranger's views of Ireland. Dublin. Royal Irish Academy.

Empey, C. A. 1984 A case study of the primary phase of Anglo-Norman settlement: the lordship of Kells. Old Kilkenny Review 3 (1), 32–40.