Ballincollig Castle is a Norman castle to the south of the town of Ballincollig, County Cork, Ireland, built after the Norman invasion of Ireland. In its prime, the castle was inhabited by the Barrett family, who had control of the local area. [1] The castle still stands today, albeit largely in ruin. [2] The original keep still remains, as does most of the curtain wall and two towers.
An earlier castle may have been built on the site by Sir Robert Coll, a Norman knight, whose name also likely influenced the name of the town of Ballincollig (Baile an Choillaigh or the 'Town of the Colls'). [3] [4] While a date for this original construction is not confirmed, by 1468, the Barrett family purchased Coll's estate lands at Ballincollig, and improved and extended the castle site. [3] [5] The main structures of Ballincollig Castle were constructed at this time. [5]
The bawn (enclosure) and tower house are located on a limestone summit, [1] which has a line of sight over the low land of the Maglin Valley. Beneath the castle there is a natural cavern which runs into the rock, and around it the remains of a moat. [6]
Members of the Barrett family had travelled from Normandy with William the Conqueror. Some of these Barretts travelled with the Normans to Ireland in 1169. When Henry II parceled out the spoils of conquest in Ireland, he gave the Kingdom of Cork (from Lismore, County Waterford to County Kerry) to Milo de Cogan. De Cogan (Goggin) received land west and south of the city, and the family built a number of castles on their lands. The Barretts were underlords of the de Cogans, and travelled to conquer Connacht in 1235 under John de Cogan. They, under John Barrett, subsequently become tenants of the de Cogans at Carrigrohane. By the 15th century, the Barretts were underlords of the MacCarthys, to whom they paid rent of £11 a year from 1420. They were later tenants of the Earls of Desmond, to whom they paid 12 marks yearly. [4] By the late 1460s, the Barretts purchased Ballincollig Castle outright. [3] This is recorded in the Carew Calendar of 28 November 1611, with Sir Dominic Sarsfield writing to Lord Carew: "Ballincollig is entailed and was purchased in the 8th year of Edward 4 (1468–9) from Robert Coil [Coll], a knight. Deed of entail in my own lands". [7]
The castle became the principal Barrett stronghold until the early 17th century, when the Castlemore Barretts seem to have had control over Mourne Abbey and Garrycloyne (both in the north of the Barony), together with Castleinch, Ballincollig and Cloghan McUllick. The Barretts also controlled Carrigrohane for some time. [4]
During the 1590s, a dispute arose. In July 1591, Andrew Barrett and sixty others assaulted Ballincollig Castle and dispossessed Edmund Barrett, "with swords, guns, great sledges or hammers, skenes, stones and staves". [8] Three years later, Edmund got a decree of £100 against the Sheriff of County Cork, for refusing to execute a writ dispossessing Andrew Barrett and others who had seized the castle. In the following year, 1595, Edmund took his cousin to court. A fine of £20 was imposed on Andrew and lesser fines on two others, and they were jailed. [8]
By the early 17th century, the Barretts had lost Ballincollig Castle. The family had borrowed money to pay for court fines and dowries, and obtained a mortgage on the castle and lands in 1618 from the Coppingers of Cork. [8] Contemporary papers note that "William Barrett of Ballincollig in the County of Cork, gent,… in consideration of £240 paid by Edmond Coppinger Fitzrobert of Corke, gent, the said William Barrett granted to the said Edmond Coppinger, his heirs and assigns forever all that and those the castles, bawnes, towns, villages, hamlets, lands, tenements and hereditaments of and in Ballincolly…". This mortgage was transferred to Sir Walter Coppinger, Cloghane (near Skibbereen) and in 1630 for the payment of £790 to the Barretts, Coppinger came into full possession of the castle and lands. [9]
By 1644, the castle was taken by Oliver Cromwell's forces, [10] and around 1689 it was garrisoned for James II. [6] After 1690, it fell into disuse and disrepair. [8]
Standing disused and ruined for several centuries, the keep was repaired by the Wyse family in 1857. [5] Today, the castle and its lands remain in private ownership. [11] The main tower house at Ballincollig Castle is recorded in the Archaeological Survey of Ireland's Sites and Monuments Record (SMR) as entry 'CO073-062', with the bawn enclosure and cave recorded as SMR numbers 'CO073-062001' and 'CO073-062002', respectively. [12]
The castle consisted of a large walled enclosure (or bawn), with a tower or keep on one side of it and possibly a large hall through the middle. [5] Most of the enclosing bawn or outer walls remain. These walls are about 5 feet (1.5 m) thick and 15 feet (5 m) high. [13] The space on top was defended by a parapet with flights of steps leading up at several points. [13] There were two defensive towers on the wall, one at present in ruins in the south-east corner and the second on the south wall. [5]
The enclosure is between 70 and 100 feet (21 and 30 m) across and is rocky and uneven. [13] There appears to be evidence of a hall in the middle, as one portion of the outer wall has the remains of a fireplace and chimney and a window of two lights. It is suggested that the towers on the outer wall and the hall are of 15th century making and were probably built after the castle was sold to the Barretts by Robert Coll. [2]
The main tower or keep is of the 13th century and was likely used by Coll.[ citation needed ] Added-to by the Barretts, this keep was repaired by the Wyse family in 1857. [5] During these renovations, a shield was inserted on the east wall. It bears the monogram 'W' and the date 1857 beneath it.
The keep is 45 to 50 feet (14 to 15 m) high. The ground floor is vaulted and originally had no entrance to it except by a trap door from above. The room on the first floor had a path up to it, carried on arches. It is about 7.5 by 9 feet (2.3 by 2.7 m). A very narrow staircase leads to other stories, all of which have stone floors on solid arches. [5] To support them, the two walls on which they rest are thicker than the others. The second story has seats in the lambs of the loopholes, a drain from a garderobe (lavatory) and a small square cupboard in the wall over it. [5] The upper floor and chief chamber seem to have had windows added on all sides in the middle of the 19th century. There are loopholes in other parts of the walls of the keep. [14] The lack of windows and a fireplace, and the fact that the small rooms occupied all the internal space between the walls, suggests that the building was more of a keep for last defence than regular living quarters.[ citation needed ]
Mourne Abbey, or Mourneabbey, is a small civil and Roman Catholic parish in the barony of Barretts, northwest County Cork, Ireland. The parish is situated just south of Mallow, on the main Mallow-Cork Road and Rail Line. The population of the parish is about 1,000 people. There are two churches and schools in the area, Analeentha and Burnfort. The civil parish consists of 17 townlands.
Barryscourt Castle is a castle located in eastern County Cork in southern Ireland, close to the town of Carrigtwohill.
Parke's Castle is a 17th century semi-fortified manor house, situated on the northeast shore of Lough Gill, in the north of County Leitrim, in the western province of Connacht, Ireland. The castle is built on the site of an earlier sixteenth-century O'Rourke Gaelic tower house. The castle and bawn had come into the possession of Robert Parke by 1628, possibly earlier. He had been granted some of the former O'Rourke lands as part of the Plantations. By 1635, Parke had completed his fortified manor house on the site of the older Gaelic castle.
Dunasead Castle, sometimes known as Baltimore Castle, is a 17th-century fortified house situated in the town of Baltimore in County Cork, Ireland. The tower house is built on the site of an earlier Norman-era structure, which itself replaced an earlier Bronze Age ringfort. Traditionally associated with the chiefs of clan O'Driscoll, the castle was purchased and restored by members of the McCarthy family in the late 1990s, and partially opened to the public from 2005.
Dunkerron Castle is a ruined four-storey tower house located in Templenoe, near Kenmare, County Kerry, in south-west Ireland. The castle was the family seat of the O'Sullivan Mór family from the late 16th century.
Kilbolane Castle is a historical fortification atop Kilbolane Hill, half a kilometre from the village of Milford, County Cork, Ireland. The castle was built in the 15th or 16th century but employed a 13th-century Norman style with high walls joined by circular guard towers and surrounded by a moat, similar to Liscarroll and Ballincollig.
Dripsey is a village in County Cork on the R618 regional road around 20 km (12 mi) west of Cork City. It is situated on a tributary of the River Lee, the Dripsey River. It is in the Catholic parish of Inniscarra. The Dripsey area hosts a water treatment plant, the Cork offices of the Environmental Protection Agency, and an award-winning garden center. The village has one pub, a primary school and a pre-school.
Dunlough Castle, standing atop the cliffs at the northern tip of the Mizen Peninsula, looks at the Atlantic Ocean from the extreme southwest point of Ireland. Founded in 1207 by Donagh O’Mahony, Dunlough is one of the oldest castles in Ireland and an example of Norman architecture and dry stone masonry.
In Ireland at the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth century, the fortified house, along with the stronghouse, developed as a replacement for the tower house. 'Fortified Houses' were often rectangular, or sometimes U or L-shaped, three-storey structures with high gables and chimney stacks and large windows with hood mouldings. Some examples have square towers at the corners. The interiors were relatively spacious with wooden partitions and numerous fireplaces. In a number of cases 'Fortified Houses' were built onto pre-existing tower houses. 'Fortified Houses' were protected by gun fire from the angle towers and bartizans, and were also provided with bawn walls with gunloops, towers and protected gateways. 'Fortified Houses' were built throughout Ireland by large landowners from a variety of backgrounds, such as the Old English Earl of Clanricarde who built Portumna Castle in County Galway; Gaelic lords such as MacDonogh MacCarthy, Lord of Duhallow, who built Kanturk Castle in County Cork; and Cromwellian soldiers such as Sir Charles Coote, who built Rush Hall in County Offaly.
Over the past six decades studies concerning Irish 'Fortified Houses' have identified them as a transitional genre that emerged at the end of the sixteenth century and acted as an architectural bridge between the Irish medieval tower-house and the country manor house of the late seventeenth century. The 'Fortified House' drew on the earlier tradition of the tower-house and was influenced by the Tudor and emerging Jacobean architecture from England and the Classical and Military architecture coming from Continental Europe. The social, political and military changes that took place from the 1580s-1650s were to play a major role in the development of this unique Irish structure. These houses provided a comfortable living space for the elite of early seventeenth-century Irish society. They were fashionable yet defendable. The 'Fortified House' was a public display of power and wealth. They represented a long term investment in their owner’s regional future and were monuments to an aspiration for an English and Continental house style suited to local Irish conditions. On a basic level the construction of a 'Fortified House' represented the owners’ desire to modernise and Anglicize.
Clan Barrett is an Irish clan from County Cork that originally descended from Normans who came to Ireland with Strongbow in the 12th century. They are related to the ancestors of the Clan Barrett of County Mayo, who until recently were otherwise considered Gaelic in origin. Of the two, the Cork branch was considered numerically stronger, while the Mayo-Galway branch held more prominence in the Middle Ages.
Moorstown Castle is a late 15th-century stone structure consisting of an enclosed circular keep near Clonmel, County Tipperary, Ireland.
Muskerry West is one of the baronies of Ireland, a historical geographical unit of land. Its chief town is Macroom. It is one of 24 baronies in the county of Cork. It may also be viewed as a half barony because sometime before the 1821 census, it was divided from its other half – Muskerry East. Other neighbouring baronies include Duhallow to the north and the Barony of Carbery East to the south.
Muskerry East is one of the baronies of Ireland, an historical geographical unit of land. Its chief town is Ballincollig. It is one of 24 baronies in the county of Cork. It may also be viewed as a half barony because some time before the 1821 census data, it was divided from its other half - Muskerry West. Other neighbouring baronies include Cork to the east, Duhallow to the north and the barony of Barretts to the north-east.
Carrigrohane is a village and civil parish situated on the south bank of the River Lee to the west of the city of Cork in Ireland. It is connected by the Carrigrohane Straight, 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Cork and is also in the northeastern part of Ballincollig. It contains St Peter's Church of the Resurrection. In 1837, it had a population of 1921 inhabitants. The civil parish is almost evenly split between the baronies of Muskerry East to the west and the Barony of Cork to the east.
Carrigrohane Castle is located in the village of Carrigrohane, barony of Barretts in County Cork, Ireland. It is situated on a rocky cliff-edge which overlooks the River Lee.
Kilcrea Castle is a ruined 15th-century towerhouse and bawn located near the Kilcrea Friary, west of Cork City, Ireland. The tower house and friary were both built by Cormac Laidir MacCarthy, 9th Lord of Muskerry.
Macroom Castle, in the centre of the town of Macroom, was once residence and fortress of the Lords of Muskerry. The castle has changed owners many times, has been besieged, burned, and rebuilt. The MacCarthys of Muskerry owned it with some interruptions from about 1353 when Muskerry was given to Dermot MacCarthy, 1st Lord of Muskerry, until 1691 when Donogh MacCarthy, 4th Earl of Clancarty lost it definitively.
Togher Castle, is a late 16th century tower house primarily known for its association with the MacCarthys of Gleannacroim. It is located approximately 9 kilometres (5.6 mi) north of the town of Dunmanway in the townland of Togher, which derives from the Irish "tóchar" meaning "causeway", or "causeway of wood over a bog".
Shandon Castle, originally known as Lord Barry's Castle, was an early medieval castle in the Shandon area of Cork city in Ireland. It was built in the late 12th century by Philip de Barry, close to an earlier ringfort. Located outside the city's gates and defensive walls, the castle was a seat of the Cambro-Norman de Barry family for several centuries.