Bawn

The National Monuments Service's description

In farmyard complex. Castle (LI023-026----) and bawn recorded here in Civil Survey belonging to MacClancy family (Donnelly 1994, vol. 2, 47). Some remains of a tower house (11.5m x 9m) that had been lowered in height and converted into a thatched two-storey dwelling survived here in 1990 though by then much ruined (ibid.). This has since been demolished and a farm shed now stands on the site. Tower house type castle with two storey house attached to one side depicted at this location on the Down Survey map of Clanwilliam Barony (Hib. Reg.). The castle is depicted in a similar fashion on the Down Survey map of Caherconlish parish (NLI, MS 718). Ballyvorneen House may be the two storey house added on to the side of the tower house in the 17th century as depicted on the Down Survey parish map of Caherconlish (ibid.). The 1654-56 Civil Survey of Limerick recorded that Connor Clancie [Clancy] of Ballybricken, an Irish Papist was the owner of the lands of Ballyvorneen which contained 'a lardge Castle bawen and orchard' (Simington 1938, 68).
Ballyvorneen House described by the Ordnance Survey Name Books for the parish of Caherconlish as following; 'This house, the property of the Gabbetts, is now occupied by a tenant. It is 2 story high, of a decayed appearance, and was rebuilt some time ago on the site of an old castle, the seat of Clancey, one of the chieftains of old' (OSNB). This house was described by the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (NIAH) as a 'Detached two-storey house, built c. 1700, on site of c. 1100 castle. Pitched slate roof with chimneystack on west gable. Rendered walls. Square-headed window openings. Multiple-bay single-storey outbuilding to site with pitched slate roof, rendered walls, loop openings, square-headed openings and segmental-arched openings' (www.buildingsofireland.ie; NIAH Reg. No. 21902318).

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of upload: 21 June 2020

References

NLI, MS 718 - National Library of Ireland, Parish maps with terriers, showing forfeited lands in County Limerick, commonly known as the "Down Survey", executed under the direction of Sir William Petty, 1657, and copied by Daniel O'Brien, 1786.

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.

Donnelly, C.J. 1994 The Tower Houses of County Limerick, 3 vols, unpublished Phd thesis, Queens University, Belfast

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.

OSNB - Ordnance Survey Name Books. Pro-forma books arranged by Civil Parish for recording townland and other name-forms and compiled in the course of the OS 6-inch survey 1824-1841. The name books also include minor names and incidental references to antiquities. National Archives of Ireland.