Castle - tower house

The National Monuments Service's description

Carriganea Castle in the townland of Ballyshonickbane stands on a moated rocky knoll, in woodland, surrounded by marshy ground, townland boundary with Drominclara 75m to N and Tobermurry 180m to E. Described by Westropp as a rectangular-shaped tower (H 18ft [6m] x Wth 16ft [4.8m]) standing on a rocky knoll which is approx. 30ft [9m] high and defined around the base by a wide fosse visible at N. On top of the rock there were two ivy-covered ruinous buildings (1906-7, 159). The castle of Carraig an Fhiaigh [Carriganea] was described in 1840 as standing 'on a limestone rock which is surrounded by a bog which rendered it not easy of access. Parts of its north and south walls to the height of about eighteen feet [5.5m] are standing but even the foundations of the other walls cannot be traced, which renders it impossible to determine its original extent, which however was not very considerable as the distance between the walls remaining is only sixteen feet [4.9m]' [OSL Kilcornan Parish; O'Flanagan 1929, 23)
Castle held by the Knight of Glin in 1578, later known as Cowleshonikyne, when held by rebel Thomas Came during the late 16th/early 17th century (ibid., 158). The 1654-56 Civil Survey of Limerick recorded that Thomas FitzGerrald of Glin and alderman Nicholas Fanning were the owners of land in Ballyshonickbane which contained 'two good houses, and Cottages on it' (Simington 1938, 354). Two buildings standing beside each other are depicted in the townland of Ballyshonickbane on the 1657 Down Survey map of Kenry barony (Hib. Reg.).
Depicted on the OS 25-inch map as a rectangular-shaped structure (approx. dims. 10m E-W x 7.5m N-S) annotated ‘Carriganea Castle (in ruins)’, standing in the angle where two watercourses split and flow past c. 15m to N and 22m to W. That to N curves around the base of the castle rock and may correspond to the wide fosse mentioned by Westropp. According to historic and modern OS mapping, this appears to terminate close to E and may have been a deliberate leat excavated as an added defensive moated feature. Obscured by woodland on Digital Globe aerial photographs taken 2011-2013 and Google Earth orthoimage taken 28/06/2018.

See attached Google Earth orthoimage and 1657 Down Survey Barony map.

Compiled by: Alison McQueen, Vera Rahilly and Caimin O’Brien

Date of upload: 8 July 2020

References

Hibernia Regnum: A set of 214 barony maps of Ireland dating to the period AD 1655-59. The original parish maps have been lost but the Hibernia Regnum maps are preserved in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris (Goblet 1932, v-x). Photographic facsimiles of these maps were published by the Ordnance Survey, Southampton in 1908.

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1929 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the county of Limerick collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1841. Bray

Simington, R.C. (ed.) 1938 The civil survey, AD 1654-1656. Vol. IV: county of Limerick, with a section of Clanmaurice barony Co. Kerry. Dublin. Irish Manuscripts Commission.

OSL - Ordnance Survey Letters. Letters written by members of the Ordnance Survey's 'Topographical Department' (T. O'Conor, A. O'Curry, E. Curry, J. O'Donovan and P. O'Keeffe) sent to headquarters from the field (1834-41). MSS in Royal Irish Academy.

Westropp, T.J. 1906-7 The ancient castles of the county of Limerick. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 26, 54-264.