Rampart and Bastion

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A range of rampart walling with an angled bastion at the north end in the centre of Antim town. It runs approximately north-east to south-west, with its main front facing south-east.

Main face of rampart walling is of blackstone rubble with a moulded corbel course supporting a crenellated parapet; crenellations are smooth cement rendered. Behind the parapet is a wall walk.

At the southern end the rampart walling including corbel course and parapet returns forward to abut a later gatehouse of 1818 (HB20/08/005).
At the northern end the rampart walling abuts a projecting angled bastion of different quality rubble stonework: plain walling without corbel course; wall topped by modern metal railings. Bastion walling returns to the north-east in similar fashion and then to the north-west where it steps up and forms a battered face with three vertical recesses at the top which looks like crenellations later filled in: at the base of the 'crenellated' top is a row of small openings which look like musket loops, with a similar row above near the head of the wall.

The bastion walling returns at the rear to the south-west, of similarly plain rubble: battered top, containing a segmental brick arched opening; buttress to right, behind which is a flight of granite steps with modern metal railings leading up to a platform at wall-walk level. Inner side of north-west and north-east faces of bastion consist of base or plinth of basalt rubble, with brick facing above, in same plane. Brick flat arches or segmental arches to deep recessed openings.

The rear face of the rampart walling at the wall-walk is of exposed rubble as previous; concrete path; ramped grassy banks, containing plantings, to the rear of that.

Setting

The rampart walling and bastion stand at the western end of Market Square within the built-up area of the town. It is adjoined at the southern end by the 'barbican' gatehouse (HB20/08/005). At the northern end it is adjoined by what appear to be 19th century walls of basalt rubble, crenellated, with a square pier and a four-centred arched doorway dressed in blue engineering brick, leading into a small open courtyard, paved with concrete bricks and laid out with rectangular flower beds containing saplings; low basalt plinth wall along north-east side; north-west side is of basalt rubble walling terminating at the north end in a new basalt rubble pier, and containing a two-centred red brick arched and dressed doorway alongside a granite coupled window, now missing its mullion. Rear face of north-west wall is of rubble partly smooth cement rendered. Across the main front of the rampart walling and bastion is a grassed strip incorporating flower beds each side of a modern memorial slab or pier. Across the rear of the rampart walling and bastion is a grassed area with a modern by-pass road in front of it.

Historical information

Built originally as part of an artillery fort, by Hugh Clotworthy, possibly as early as 1596, but at least as early as 1603, with later 18th and 19th century additions when it was adapted as a part of the ornamental gardens for Antrim Castle.

The exact layout of the original fort has not been recorded but it would appear to have had at least two bastions, the surviving one to the north, and one to the south, which was later impinged upon by the so-called 'barbican' gatehouse of 1818.

It would appear to have been maintained as a defensive structure throughout the 17th century, and indeed it was reputedly from it that the rebels were fired upon during the 'Battle of Antrim' in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, but at some time probably in the 18th century it was made into a productive and ornamental feature of the castle gardens: these were the 'terrace gardens' described in the Ordnance Survey Memoirs in the 1830s as "a beautiful range of flower beds extending along 3 sides of a square 110 by 108 yards … A high wall encloses them from a kitchen garden in the centre and a low one from the grounds on the outside". They were further described in 1860 as having been "formed out of the two ancient bastions: one is square, and the other oblong; both are elevated to a height of about twenty feet above the level of the park, and are reached by wide granite steps. These gardens are enclosed at the town side by the park wall, and the enclosure walls on the other sides are covered outside with ivy, and inside with fruit trees".

In 1972 the main part of the terrace gardens were destroyed by the creation of a new road, which obliterated the low brick cross walls which subdivided the raised area into four gardens, and left the present bastion and walling cut off from the main part of the castle grounds.

In 1999 the bastion and walling of the ramparts was restored.

The portion of walling running south from the 'barbican' gate-house to terminate in a small angular turret near the river also appears on the OS map of 1832; its precise date is uncertain but it may possibly date from the period of building of the 'barbican' gate-house of 1818.

The bastion and its walling north of the 'barbican' gate-house were protected as a scheduled monument in June 2005 ANT050:183.

The pier, gateways, window and walling of the courtyard enclosure at the north end appear to be part of a garden attached to the now demolished 19th century estate cottages at 1 and 3 Castle Street.

References – Primary Sources
1. OS Map 1832, Co Antrim 50.

Secondary Sources
1. Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland, Vol 29: Parishes of County Antrim XI, 1832-3, 1835-9 (Belfast, 1995), p 49.
2. C.H. O'Neill, Antrim Castle, reprinted from the Dublin University Magazine (Dublin, 1860), pp 5, 8, 31.
3. UAHS, Antrim and Ballymena (Belfast, 1969), p 6.
4. W.D. Girvan, 'The Forgotten Garden', Ulster Garden Handbook (1974).
5. A. Smyth, The Story of Antrim (Antrim, 1984), pp 16-17.
6. J. Hanna, Old Antrim (Catrine, Ayrshire, 2002), pp 31 and 34.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

A range of blackstone rampart walling including an angled bastion built around 1600 with later 18th and 19th century additions. This is the remaining portion of a late 16th to early 17th century artillery fort which was of some significance in the Elizabethan/Jacobean Plantation of Ulster. The original physical context of the structure has been greatly eroded over the years and the original quality of its setting affected by later developments, particularly the building of a new road through the original centre of the complex in 1972, but enough of it survives in a recognisable form to indicate something of the original extent and character of the fort. It is an important feature of Antrim's historical topography and a relic of the founding days of the modern town. It is protected as a scheduled monument (ANT050:183).

General comments

The starting point of the walling is at approximately J1464 8670 and the finishing point is J1467 8678.