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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Castle - tower house

Carn (Rathconrath By.), County Westmeath, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Castle - tower house, Carn, County Westmeath, with a pin at the register's coordinates
Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915), covering this location. Courtesy of the National Library of Scotland. The pin is ours, placed from the register's coordinates.

The record

Townland
Carn (Rathconrath By.)
County
Westmeath
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Carn Castle in ruins
Latest-edition OS map
Carn Castle (in Ruins)
Coordinates
53.46485, -7.54167
SMR number
WM024-123----

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David 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)
  • 1811 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1869 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

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This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on a natural hillock atop of a ridge running E-W, in pasture, with good views in all directions. Carn Castle stood on lands belonging in 1641 to Earl of Kildare in the Parish of Conry (NLI, MS 723-4). Castle described in 1983 as only a section of the S wall of the castle remains upstanding (dims. 3m E-W; 2m N-S; H 5m) with traces of wall footings extending to E and N of the S wall. There are two large sections of collapsed masonry c. 5m to W of the upstanding section which are constructed of medium sized stones bonded with a rough mortar. The ground is uneven to E and W where there has been some quarrying. There are loose stones in the general vicinity of the castle. A modern stone wall running E-W lies c. 6m to N of the S wall of the castle. There are field clearance stones to S and E of the castle. According to Guest (1936, 29), a sheela-na-gig (WM024-123001-) in the possession of Henry Upton is said to have come from the fabric of Carn Castle.

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

Date of upload: 27 August 2019

References

NLI, MS 723-4 - National Library of Ireland, The parish maps of the Down Survey for the County of Westmeath, attested by W. Petty, in 1659. Copied by Daniel O'Brien. A set of 67 maps with accompanying terriers in two volumes, 1786-7. Dublin.

Guest, E.M. 1936 Irish sheela na gigs in 1935. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 66, 107-29.

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Sites and Monuments Record data: National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Record text is reproduced unchanged. National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
All Castle - tower house in Westmeath All County Westmeath records All Ireland Heritage registers Historical markers (US)National Register of Historic Places (US)
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