Tag Archives: Architectural History

An Unhappy Trinity



Currently for sale: this trio of former almshouses on the outskirts of Glanmire, County Cork. Each slightly different from the others, the buildings, designed by an unknown architect in neo-Gothic style with lattice glazing and triangular Oriel windows, are thought to date from the 1820s and built on the instruction of the Colthurst family, perhaps Sir Nicholas Colthurst who until his death in 1829 served as Member of Parliament for nearby Cork city. Sadly, all three have been left to fall into their present dilapidated state and are now in need of complete renovation. They are available for €140,000 each.


Inside the Pale


The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, otherwise known as the Knights Hospitaller, was a Mediaeval military order founded in the 12th century. The order came to have a number of bases, called preceptories, in Ireland, one of which was located at Kilteel, County Kildare. There seems to be some confusion about when this was established, and by whom: it may have been Gerald FitzMaurice, first Lord of Offaly, who died in 1204, or his son Maurice FitzGerald, the second lord who died in 1257. It must have been an important centre for the order, since three general chapters were held there during the 14th century. However, with the onset of the suppression of religious orders in the 16th century, Kilteel Preceptory was surrendered to the English authorities in 1540 and two years later granted to Thomas Alen, brother of Sir John Alen, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Thereafter it fell into decay and little now remains of the buildings other than a few truncated stone columns, parts of a former gatehouse and the outline of a substantial enclosure. More impressive are the adjacent ruins of Kilteel Castle.





Kilteel stands on the boundary of the Pale, that area around Dublin which in the later Middle Ages remained under the control of the English government. Famously, in order to provide protection for its inhabitants, in 1429 King Henry VI offered a grant of £10 to every man within the Pale who built a castle over the next ten years. These castles, usually square or rectangular and several storeys high, are commonly known in Ireland as tower houses, and while they were being constructed prior to the king’s grant – and are similar to the Peel Houses found on the border separating England and Scotland – many of them date from the 15th century onwards. Such would appear to be the case with Kilteel Castle, which measures around 26 by 20 feet and rises five storeys to a height of 46 feet. The building is distinguished from many other examples by a curved projecting staircase in one corner and beside this a two-storey gate house with arched entrance. Immediately behind the tower houses is a large rectangular space, now used as a farmyard but perhaps demarcating the former bawn enclosure. An image published in the Dublin Penny Journal in October 1833 shows a two-storied gabled house, perhaps dating from the 17th century, on the other side of the gatehouse. Some of the outer walls of this building survive, sections of which are fronted with slates. 





Like the Knights Hospitallers preceptory, Kilteel Castle passed into the hands of Thomas Alen in the 1540s and his family appear to have remained owners of the property until the second half of the 17th century (although, according to Samuel Lewis’s Topographical Dictionary of Ireland, they were still claiming tithes there in 1837). However, repeated attacks on the building took their toll on its condition. It was raided and burnt by Rory O’More in both 1573 and 1574 but presumably remained in sufficiently good condition for the 11th Earl of Kildare to station 50 horsemen and 100 foot soldiers there in 1580 during the Second Desmond Rebellion. But in the aftermath of the following century’s Confederate Wars, the Civil Survey of 1654-56 could report that the parish of Kilteel contained ‘One Castle…wch in the year 1640 was valued to be worth sixty pounds butt being since ruined is now valued at ffourty pounds.’ In the second half of the 17th century, Kilteel Castle came into the possession of the Earl of Tyrconnell but following his support of James II the property was taken from him and acquired by the Hollow Sword Blade Company before being sold on in turn to Sir William Fownes. His descendants in turn disposed of Kilteel in 1838, by which time the old castle had long since ceased to be used as any kind of residence. 

Almost Identical Twins



The entrance gateway to the now-demolished Lissadorn, County Roscommon. Extant photographs show this to have been a fine house of three bays and three storeys over raised basement, possibly late 18th or early 19th century in construction. The design of this neoclassical triple archway, thought to date from c.1825, has been attributed to the Roscommon architect Richard Richards, not least because at that time he was working at Mount Talbot, some 25 miles to the south. The unfortunate history of that house has already been told (See An Unhappy Tale « The Irish Aesthete), and, as if to confirm that Richards designed the Lissadorn entrance, it is almost identical to that at Mount Talbot, the only difference being that the former lacks the keystones seen in the latter’s arches. 


A Quiet Spot


‘A fifth tower stood at Aghaviller, (probably Agha-oillir, field of the pilgrim) the lower part only remains; above the foundation it measured fifty feet round; beneath this, it has a circular base, projecting six inches, and fourteen inches high, resting on a square foundation; that at Kilree is built in the same way, as the others probably are: this tower is peculiar by having a door-way even with the ground, and apparently co-eval with the building; this door way is five feet one inch high, two feet nine inches wide at top, and from two to three feet wide at bottom: internal diameter of the building, eight feet ten inches, wall four feet thick, two courses remain for floors, and part of a third story with a small window: on the first, an old floor is remembered to have stood about forty years ago. The first story within, is twelve feet high; without, it is thirteen feet to the old door way, which this had, like others, opening to the first floor, but which has been modernly walled up. The tower stands twenty feet to the S. of the foundation of the old church and at the S. W. angle; it is built of siliceous breccia.’
From A Statistical Survey of the County of Kilkenny by William Tighe (1802)




‘The pillar tower is fifty-one feet in circumference at the base; hence the diameter is sixteen feet two inches. There are two doorways; one at the ground level, of cut stone, rectangular, with places for hanging-irons; a small bolt hole and a rabate are on the inside; it is five feet two inches high by two feet ten and a half inches wide and looks N.E. The other doorway, and in all probability the original one is about 13 feet up from the ground to the door-still. The higher and narrow that on one below, and looks north. A rectangular open, of dressed stone, is situated at about twenty-seven feet up; it may be three feet high by two wide; its aspect is S.S.W. The tower terminates a few feet above this open, begin only a dilapidated stump.’
From Transactions of the Kilkenny Archaeological Society (1855)




Although a number of authors have written about the ruins found at Aghaviller, County Kilkenny, much of the site’s history remains obscure, and even the origins of its name open to question. For example, in his 1856 Introduction to the Annals of the Four Masters, John O’Donovan is scathing about Tighe’s earlier suggestion that the place’s name derived from the Irish meaning Field of the Pilgrim, declaring this to be ‘a mere silly guess by one who had no acquaintance with the Irish annals or Irish literature, and who indulged in those wild etymological conjectures which characterize the Irish antiquaries of the previous century.’ (O’Donovan instead insisted that the Irish name meant ‘Field of the Watercresses’). Even the origin of the religious foundation here continue to be uncertain. The church was dedicated to St Brénainn (that is, St Brendan of Birr, rather than the more famous St Brendan of Clonfert) and dates from the 12th century, although it underwent modifications in the 15th century when a substantial tower, serving as residence for the clerics, was built over the chancel: the latter survives but only the foundations of the nave can be seen. The round tower adjacent is notable both for being truncated and for being set on a square stone plinth. A quiet spot less well know or visited than many other such sites in the county.

For Gentlemen Farmers



Bloomville, County Offaly is a particularly charming late 18th century gentleman farmer’s residence, of two storeys and five bays with a somewhat anachronistic Gibbsian door at its centre. The original block is just one room deep but a three-bay extension to the rear provides additional accommodation, as do single storey wings on either side: that to the east contains a drawing room with generous bow window and conical roof.


A Repetitive Story


Twenty years ago this week, the contents of Lissadell, County Sligo were offered for sale at auction. The importance of accumulated house contents is insufficiently appreciated in this country. Often spanning hundreds of years of occupation by the same family, they represent changes in taste, and in affluence, not just of a particular property’s owners, but of the entire country. They inform our knowledge of Ireland’s history through both good times and bad, and provide enlightenment about how our forebears, of whatever status, lived. Accordingly, their dispersal represents the dissipation of knowledge, leaving us all less well-informed and thereby poorer. In the case of Lissadell, the house, and its predecessor, had been home to generations of the same family, among whom was the revolutionary politician Constance Markievicz. Her association with the building, along with that of many other distinguished figures in Irish history, led to a widespread public campaign for the property and surrounding estate to be bought by the state. As has been so often the case, before and since, this did not happen, and accordingly Lissadell’s contents were auctioned. One of the key losses from this event was a collection of furniture specifically commissioned by an earlier owner, Sir Robert Gore-Booth, for the house. Dating from the 1830s, these pieces were representative of taste in Ireland at the time and were believed to have been made by the Dublin firm of Williams & Gibton. Until the auction, Lissadell was the only house in Ireland to retain its original furniture by this company, so the dispersal was much to be regretted. The items’ importance can be gauged by the fact that most of the lots exceeded their estimates: a rosewood writing table, for example, which was expected to make €8,000-€10,000, fetched €19,000. In the dining room, a set of 17 mahogany chairs (€12,000-€18,000) fetched €22,000 and the dining table itself (€30,000-€50,000) went for €65,000. Forced to bid against other potential purchasers, Lissadell’s new private owners managed to acquire some pieces, such as a pair of handsome mahogany Grecian-style bookcases clearly inspired by the work of Thomas Hope and, again in the dining room, a sturdy mahogany sideboard. But many of the contents, first installed some 170 years earlier, now left for good and not just the Williams & Gibton furniture. There were, for example, a number of fine 17th century Italian baroque paintings, many in spectacular gilt frames, which had been acquired for the rooms by Sir Robert Gore-Booth. And then there were all the miscellaneous objects that build up in any house over generations, from sets of copper jelly moulds to discarded furnishings such as old curtains. These, as much as the more valuable pieces, are what inform the history of a building, and when they are gone, part of that history disappears forever. 





In Ireland, it has long been apparent that if the remaining number of historic houses and contents are to survive, then a coherent strategy to secure their future needs to be considered. The first attempt to devise such a strategy occurred back in 1985 when a body called the Irish Historic Properties Commission, established three years earlier, produced a report written by the late Kevin B Nolan and Lewis Clohessy and called Safeguarding Historic Houses. This clearly stated that ‘our heritage historic properties cannot be preserved without the active and consistent support of the Irish Government.’ Eight years later, in 1993 the Irish Georgian Society and another body since gone, Irish Heritage Properties, held a conference on the future of the Irish country house, subsequently publishing a report on its proceedings. This makes for melancholy reading, since so many of the problems then highlighted remain to the present day, not least the want of sufficient support from central and local government. Ten years later again, Professor Terence Dooley of Maynooth University, at the request of the Irish Georgian Society and the Dept of Environment, Heritage and Local Government, produced a report, A Future for Irish Historic Houses? A Study of Fifty Houses. A year later, the same government department invited Indecon International Consultants to produce an Examination of the Issue of Trust-type Organisations to Manage Heritage Properties in Ireland. Most recently, in 2015 the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht in collaboration with Irish Historic Houses Association after extensive consultation with a wide variety of interested parties and stakeholders, issued an Action Plan for the Sustainable Future of the Irish Historic House in Private Ownership, a document which was duly approved by the Irish cabinet and appeared in 2016. In other words, no one can complain that the challenges facing the Irish country house and the retention of its contents have been insufficiently examined and analysed. Produced over a period of almost 40 years, these and other documents have constantly made the same point: that houses in private ownership, if they are to have a viable future and hold onto their original furnishings, need assistance from central and local government, the kind of assistance that is available in other European countries but has consistently failed to materialise to any adequate extent in Ireland.





Outside observers often note with surprise that in Ireland there is no equivalent of the National Trust which operates on the other side of the Irish Sea and in Northern Ireland. An attempt was made to create such an equivalent with the establishment of the Irish Heritage Trust in 2006. The IHT was largely the brainchild of the Irish Georgian Society’s current president Sir David Davies. The original purpose of this organisation was that it would, like the National Trust, acquire for public access significant heritage properties deemed to be at risk and for which the State did not want to assume direct responsibility. This would ensure that the houses and their contents would remain intact and preserved for future generations. At the time of its establishment and in recognition of the potential significance of IHT’s work, the government of the time earmarked €35 million for the organisation over the duration of the National Development Plan 2007-2013. Accordingly the IHT entered into discussions with the owners of a number of properties judged to be most suitable for such an arrangement. At all times the relevant government department – for Environment, Heritage and Local Government as well as the Department of Finance – was briefed on developments at Anne’s Grove and in 2008 all relevant parties agreed the IHT would assume responsibility for its first estate thanks to an endowment fund of €5 million (drawn from its National Development Plan funding) and associated tax credits. Then in December 2008, the department’s minister wrote to the IHT advising that due to changing circumstances it would not be possible to provide the necessary support. The IHT has since successfully reinvented itself, but the fact remains that there is still no equivalent of the National Trust in Ireland, and historic properties, along with their contents, continue to be lost because of want of state support for their survival. Today’s photographs show the empty interiors of Howth Castle, sold in 2019 after being occupied for more than 800 years by the same family. The house’s remaining contents were dispersed at public auction two years ago in September 2021. Unless there is a change in state policy towards these properties, and towards the histories they contain, more such sales will occur in the years ahead. And we will continue to be the poorer. 

Early Industry


The former flour mills at Shrule, County Longford. Rising adjacent to the river Inny and thought to date from the start of the 19th century, it appears to be a rare example of an early industrial premises in this part of the country. Samuel Lewis, in his Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837), wrote that it annually produced around 4,000 barrels of flour. The business must have been successful because around 1850 a five-storey extension was added to the existing L-shaped building. However, the mills appear to have closed down at the start of the last century and the entire complex is now roofless and empty. 

The Real Deel



The ruins of the late 18th century Deel Castle, otherwise known as Castle Gore, in County Mayo have featured here before (see Sent Up in Flames « The Irish Aesthete) but rather confusingly the remains of a second, older building with the same name stand close by. The original Deel Castle – which might be classified as the real Deel – is a tower house sitting above the river Deel, thought to date from the 16th century when constructed by the Bourke family, then dominant in this part of the country. Like so many other such buildings, it is rectangular but larger than usual, of four storeys and with a substantial bartizan on the south-west corner of the roofline, above which rise tall, narrow chimneystacks. As is also typical of tower houses, there is only one point of access, a modest arched doorcase on the west side. It remained in the possession of the Bourke family until the late 17th century when, after Colonel Thomas Bourke had fought on the side of King James in the Williamite Wars, the property was forfeited and granted to Sir Arthur Gore.




Born in London, Paul Gore (created a baronet in 1622) had come to Ireland in the late 16th century in the service of Elizabeth I as commander of a troop of horse and eventually settled in County Donegal, representing Ballyshannon for a number of years in the Irish House of Commons. Arthur Gore (created a baronet in 1662) was his second son, and likewise both a soldier and politician, becoming High Sheriff of both Mayo and County Galway, and later of Leitrim. Having settled in Mayo, he received the Bourkes‘ former property, Castle Deel and in due course, his son having predeceased him, passed this to his grandson, also called Arthur Gore. When Mrs Delany visited the place in 1732, she noted, ‘tis an old castle patched up and very irregular, but well fitted up and good handsome rooms within. The master of the house, Arthur Gore, a jolly red-faced widower, has one daughter, a quiet thing that lives in the house with him; his dogs and horses are as dear to him as his children, his laugh is hearty, though his jests are course.’ The second baronet’s son, yet another Arthur, was created Earl of Arran in 1762. It would appear that the family continued to live in Deel Castle but towards the end of the 18th century, the estate was leased to James Cuff, first (and last) Lord Tyrawley who built the now-ruined house within sight of the old castle. Cuff’s mother Elizabeth was a sister of Lord Arran, which helps to explain why he should have been granted a lease on the place. Lord Tyrawley had no legitimate heirs, although he had two illegitimate sons by an actress, one of whom, James Duff, lived in the new Deel Castle until his death in 1828, after which that building reverted back to the third Earl of Arran. As for the old castle, it was occupied by Colonel St George Cuff, thought to have been the illegitimate son of James Cuff; the colonel’s wife Louisa Maria Knox Gore, was descended in the maternal line from the second Earl of Arran, making the family connection clearer. It was only after the colonel’s death in 1883 that the old castle likewise returned to the Gores and remained with them until after 1921 when the new house was burnt by the IRA and left the ruin still seen today.




As already mentioned, the original Deel Castle was a substantial tower house. To the east of this, possibly as early as the 17th century, an extension was built which was probably further improved in the 18th century. A bartizan on the south-east corner of the extension certainly suggests an early date, since it would come from a time when the occupants of the building would consider themselves vulnerable to attack. In any case, this section is of three storeys and five bays, with a limestone Gibbsian doorcase on the groundfloor. The outline of a gable on the eastern side of the facade indicates that a further building once stood here, perhaps to match that which still extends forward immediately beyond the tower house to the west, thereby creating a courtyard in front of the building. Little remains inside either the original or the later structure, the roof long gone, along with the various floors, windows and chimneypieces: the external walls alone now survive. This decay has occurred only in the past 100 years since, unlike its neighbour, Deel Castle was not burnt during the early 1920s but still occupied. Only afterwards was it abandoned, and left to fall into the present state of ruin. 


Just a Skeleton



The skeleton of the former Roman Catholic chapel in Hugginstown, County Kilkenny. This building was constructed c.1800, in other words almost three decades before Catholic Emancipation, and had an interior that preserved its original decoration, a rare survivor from that period. However, as so often is the case, this was judged to be outdated and forty years ago the church was put out of service, with  a singularly unimpressive replacement erected elsewhere in the village. The interior was subsequently dismantled and the roof removed, so that today only the shell seen here remains. 


A Palimpsest of Irish Architectural History


Descended from the late 10th century High King of Ireland Máel Sechnaill mac Domnaill, for much of the period following the Norman invasion, the O’Melaghlins (later McLoughlin) were a dominant family in what is now Westmeath. As such, they built various fortified residences for themselves, including the core of what is today called Moate Castle: the town of Moate derives its name from the motte and bailey which was erected here by the Normans. The O’Melaghlin castle is thought to have been constructed around 1500 and remained in their hands for a century until sold by Feardorcha O’Melaghlin to Hubert Dillon, who lived a short distance north of Moate at Drumraney. However, in the upheavals of the mid-17th century, Dillon’s son lost the castle, which was granted to an English soldier called Humphreys. In 1655 he, in turn, sold the property to another soldier, Captain John Clibborn, whose forebears came from Yorkshire and whose descendants would live in the place for the next couple of centuries. 






As mentioned, the Clibborns continued to live in Moate Castle for some 200 years; in Samuel Lewis’s Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837), it was listed as the residence of Cuthbert John Clibborn. Following his death in 1847, he was succeeded by his eldest son Thomas Strettel Clibborn, then aged just ten. Having graduated as an engineer from Trinity College Dublin, in 1859 Thomas Strettel Clibborn emigrated to Australia where he spent the rest of his life, where thanks to his keen interest in racing, he became secretary of the Australian Jockey Club, where he proved to be an outstandingly effective administrator, remaining in the position until shortly before his death in 1910. In Burke’s Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland (published 1912), Clibborn’s eldest son George Holmes Clibborn’s elder son is listed as being ‘of the Castle, Moate, County Westmeath’ but he likely never lived there as even during his father’s lifetime it seems to have been rented to a succession of tenants, including Gilbert Nugent (later of Jamestown Court), a Quaker businessman called William Wooley and Edward Fetherstonhaugh. At the beginning of the last century, the local postmaster, a Mr Moore occupied the building, followed by Mr Gardiner, who taught at the local Church of Ireland school. For just over half a century, the property has been owned by the Mitchell Family who recently placed it on the market.






Moate Castle sits high above the town’s main street but what can be seen from here is actually the back of the building: the main entrance is on the other, north-facing side and looks out over several acres of enclosed land, presumably once laid out as gardens. The original castle is in the eastern section of the main house and is of two bays and three storeys. Various additions were made to this from the late 17th to the end of the 18th centuries, beginning with an extension to the immediate west which is likewise three storeys high and of three bays. At the western extremity and on the rear, a two-storey bow-fronted extension was also added at some unknown date. Returning to the facade, this shows a four-bay house of three storeys, the interior accessed via a relatively modest Gibbsian limestone doorcase. The building on this side is flanked by two-storey, gable-ended pavilions that createa a shallow forecourt; both of these are now in poor condition but must once have been fine structures. Beyond the eastern pavilion is the yard with stables and coach house: here a Sheela na gig has been inserted into the wall immediately above a Gothic arched. Stepping inside, the castle proves to be less substantial, and much more manageable as a home, than its external appearance might suggest. The entrance hall contains a  fine mid-18th century staircase giving access to the upper floors, with a drawing room to the immediate right and a passage leading to what might have been the original dining room and thence the kitchen in the old castle. Upstairs, a similar passageway leads to a number of bedrooms. Throughout the building, decoration is spare, reflecting the fact that the Clibborns were Quakers. Moate Castle deserves a thorough examination than it has been given hitherto as the house can be seen as a palimpsest of Irish architectural history across more than 500 years, reflecting changes in taste and material circumstances during that long period. The hope must be that a sympathetic new owner can be found for the property, sensitive to its significance and prepared to ensure that Moate Castle can continue to bear witness to the country’s past.