Tag Archives: Architectural History

A Pre-Eminent House


‘Pre-eminent among the Augustinian houses stands the Abbey of Clare. It was one of a group of monasteries founded by the able but unscrupulous Donald More O’Brien, the last King of Munster. To it in vivid dread of a future retribution for his bloodshedding, cruelties, and perjuries he granted many a fair quarter of land. The fortunate preservation of his foundation charter enables us to some extent to create an estates map of the abbey lands “from the ford of the two weirs” at Clare Castle, “even out to the Leap of Cuchullin” in the edge of the Atlantic…We only possess this charter in a copy made in 1461 for Thady, Bishop of Killaloe. The only other documents of Donald More are not foundation charters, but mere grants of land to Holycross Abbey and Limerick Cathedral, so they are not capable of comparison. Donald More appears in them as “Donaldus Rex Limericensis,” and “D. dí grá Limicensis,” and we find the “appurtenances,” “fields, woods, pastures, meadows, waters, &c.,” and “for the welfare of my soul and the souls of my parents” in the undoubted charters. It is true that the king’s epithet “magnus” is suspicious, but the coincidence of the presence of the bishops of Kilfenora and Limerick, whose rights were touched at Caheraderry, Iniscatha and Kilkerrily, and of the chiefs MacMahon and O’Conor, in whose territories certain lands were granted, favours the genuineness of the document. We may also note the inclusion of Killone and Inchicronan, the sites of the other Augustinian houses among the possessions of the abbey of “Forgy.” We next hear of the abbey in 1226. Pope Honorius III wrote from the Lateran to his son “T,” abbot of the monastery of SS. Peter and Paul, “de Forgio,” directing the judges to proceed against Robert Travers, who had “unjustly and by simony been made Bishop of Killaloe” by the influence of his uncle Geoffrey de Marisco, the justiciary, and the connivance of Donchad Cairbreach O’Brien, chief of Thomond, in 1217. The abbot took much trouble in the matter, and even went to Rome to inform the Pope as to the facts of the case, for which labour his expenses are directed to be paid by the bishopric…’






‘In the Papal taxation of 1302-1306, the abbey “De Forgio” was assessed at two marks, and the temporalities of its abbot at three marks. No other record occurs for a century and a half. About the end of that century, to judge from the ruins, the long church of Donald More was divided into nave and chancel by the erection of a plain and somewhat ungraceful belfry tower resting on two pointed arches of much better design than the rest of the structure. On June 18th, 1461, Thady, Bishop of Killaloe, seems to have been called upon to examine and exemplify the ancient charter. At the present time it is impossible to discover the reason for the event, and the evidently contemporaneous repairs of the southern wing of the domicile. It occurred while Teige Acomhad O’Brien was prince of Thomond, but the annals of his not very eventful reign do not help us. We might at most conjecture that the prince may have undertaken some works on the abbey to ward off disease or unpopularity, for MacFirbis, in recording his death, says “ the multitudes envious eyes and hearts shortened his days.” “Know all”—writes the prelate—“by these letters and the ancient charter of Donellusmore Ibrien, King of Limerick, founder and patron of the religious and venerable house of canons regular ‘de Forgio’ ”—what are the possessions of the abbey and its rights and alms. The full copy of the older charter is given, compared, attested, and sealed by Eugene O’Heogenayn, the notary, in the monastery of Clare, July 18th, 1461, the third year of the bishop’s consecration. It is witnessed by Donat Macrath, vicar of Killoffin; John Connagan, cleric, and Donald MacGorman…’






‘The convent was formally dissolved by Henry VIII., and granted with other lands and religious houses, to Donogh, Baron of Ibracken, in 1543. The grantee was pledged to forsake the name “Obrene,” to use the English manners, dress, and language, to keep no kerne or gallow-glasses, obey the king’s laws and answer his writs, to attend the Deputy and succour no traitors. In 1573 and again on October 2nd, 1578, it was re-granted to Conor, Earl of Thomond. It was held by Sir Donnell O’Brien and his son Teige in 1584, and confirmed to other Earls of Thomond—to Donough on January 19th, 1620, and to Henry on September 1st, 1661. It was occupied by a certain Robert Taylor about 1635. Its monastic history had not, however, closed. Nicholas O’Nelan, Abbot of Clare, is given in the list of monks living in the diocese of Killaloe in 1613, seventy years after the dissolution. Teige O’Griffa, a priest, officiated at Dromcliff, Killone, and Clare Abbey in 1622. The Rev. Dr. De Burgho, Vicar-General of Killaloe, was its Abbot, 1647-1650, and two years later Roger Ormsby and Hugh Carighy, priests of Clare, were hanged without a trial by the Puritans. They were, however, possibly parish priests, and not monks. In 1681 Thomas Dyneley’s sketch of the abbey shows it as unroofed except the south-west room with its high chimney. A small chapel, its gables boldly capped with large crosses, adjoined the east end of the abbey church, and was evidently in use. Dyneley tells us that the building “was also thought to have been founded by the sayd Duke (Lionel of Clarence, 1361), for the love he bore and in memory of a priory of that name in Suffolk, where his first wife was buried.” Dyneley probably heard this unfounded legend from some English settler, who tried to account for the name, oblivious of the plank causeway across the muddy creek which, perhaps, for centuries before Duke Lionel’s time, had given the neighbouring village its name, Claremore, or Clar atha da Choradh…’


Extracts from The Augustinian Houses of the County Clare: Clare, Killone, and Inchicronan by Thomas Johnson Westropp (Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland vol. 30, 1900).

The Lion in Winter


The Lion Gate at Mote Park, County Roscommon. This was once one of the entrances to an estate owned by the Crofton family who settled here in the second half of the 16th century; in 1798 they became Barons Crofton of Mot . In the 1620s their forebear George Crofton built Mote Castle, but it was replaced by a new house at some date between 1777-87. This property was in turn rebuilt after being gutted by fire in 1865 but only survived another century: the last of the Croftons left Mote in the 1940s after which the contents were auctioned: the house itself was demolished in the 1960s. In February 2015 its former portico, rescued at the time of the demolition, was sold at auction for €12,000.



According to a history of Mote Park compiled in 1897 by Captain the Hon Francis Crofton, the Lion Gate was erected in 1787 and its design has sometimes been attributed to James Gandon, although this is disputed. Whatever the case, it takes the form of a Doric triumphal arch with screen walls linking it to what were once a pair of identical lodges (but are now used for housing livestock). A plinth on top of the arch features a Coade Stone lion, one foot resting on a ball. Over time this had become much weathered (not helped by bees nesting inside the animal) and when taken down a few years ago three of its feet fell off. Following restoration work at the Coade workshop in Wiltshire, the lion was reinstated in September 2016 and now once more surveys what is left of the Mote parkland: this restoration was funded by a number of sources, predominantly American supporters of the Irish Georgian Society.

Fallen Out of Use


Baron Trimlestown is one of the oldest titles in Ireland, created in 1461 for Sir Robert Barnewall. The family were of Norman origin, their name originally de Berneval (from the small seaside town of Berneval-le-Grand, where Oscar Wilde stayed following his release from Reading Gaol in June 1897). Having first moved to England, following the Battle of Hastings in 1066, they followed Richard de Clare to Ireland, the first to do so, Sir Michael de Berneval, landing in Cork in 1172. Rising to power in the Pale, they were responsible for building Drimnagh Castle, now in a suburb of Dublin, and then gradually acquired substantial land holdings in County Meath. Here in Trimblestown, a few miles west of the town of Trim, they erected a mighty castle, probably in the 15th century and perhaps around the time that the title of baron was granted to Sir Robert Barnewall.






The core of Trimblestown Castle is late mediaeval, rising three storeys and with a massive square tower in the south-west corner. The main block is some 114 feet long and 40 feet wide, internally dominated by a two-storey vaulted great hall that faces towards the river Trimlestown: the exterior of this side is marked by massive corner buttresses. On the south-east side of the tower there is (or perhaps was) a shield bearing the arms of the Barnewall and Nugent families – the two had intermarried – but whether it remains in place is impossible to tell due to vegetation covering much of the walls. Considerable alterations to the building were undertaken in the 18th and 19th centuries, when a large addition was made on the northern section of the site. It is likely that at this time towers similar to those on the river front were demolished and a modern house built, the most notable feature of this being a large bow-front with views to the east. Similarities with the work undertaken during the same period at Louth Castle (see Saintly Connections, August 28th 2017) have led to suggestions that Richard Johnston might have been the architect responsible in both instances. This may have happened around 1797 when the 14th Lord Trimlestown, then aged 70, married a woman less than a third of his age: the suggestion is that she got a new house in return for an old husband. Soon afterwards, her husband also inherited Turvey, County Dublin from a distant cousin and in due course the family moved there, leaving Trimblestown Castle to slip into decay.






For much of the 18th century, although the Barnewalls held onto the greater part of their lands, they were unable to use the title Baron Trimlestown. Their problems had begun in the 1640s when Matthias, eighth Lord Trimlestown, had supported the royalist cause, deprived of his estates by Cromwell and banished to County Galway. Following the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, he regained the greater part of his original property, but remained true to the Roman Catholic faith, as did his son Robert who sat in James II’s parliament in 1689. The next couple of heirs, because of their support for the Jacobite cause and their loyalty to Catholicism, were not allowed to use the old title. They lived in France and it was only in 1746 that Robert Barnewall (who claimed the title of twelfth Lord Trimlestown) returned to Ireland and took up residence in the old castle. It is likely to have been during his lifetime (he died in 1779) that the building was first modernised. As an ardent supporter of the Catholic cause, it must have been a blow to him when his heir Thomas conformed to the Established Church (thereby reversing the government attainder and allowing him to be acknowledged after his father’s death as the 13th Lord Trimlestown). Thereafter one generation succeeded another, although more than once the title had to go to a cousin as there was no direct heir. However while there is still a Lord Trimlestown – the 21st – he has no known heirs. It seems likely that after more than 550 years one of Ireland’s oldest peerages will go the same way as the castle from which its name was derived, and fall out of use.

Class Dismissed



The former Brockagh National School in County Leitrim. Located outside the village of Glenfarne, this opened to pupils in 1885 and is typical of the buildings then being constructed for this purpose and would originally consisted of a single room (later divided into two). Seemingly closed in the 1970s when a new school was built and several smaller establishments amalgamated, like so many others across the country it has since fallen into ruin.


Still Standing


The western gable of old St Cronan’s church in Roscrea, County Tipperary. Cronan was a seventh century monk who founded a religious house, originally a short distance from Roscrea but in too remote a spot for pilgrims to find. So the monastery was re-established here and flourished for many years: the eighth century Book of Dimma, an illuminated set of the gospels now in the collection of Trinity College Dublin, was written here. Post-reformation the monastic site was used by the Church of Ireland until the early 19th century when the old church was demolished and replaced by the present building incorporating much stone from its predecessor. But the 12th century Romanesque gable was retained and for the past 200 years has served as an entrance to the churchyard.

To the Mill

The former flour mill located on the north bank of the river Boyne at Slane, County Meath. A joint enterprise between three parties, Blayney Townley Balfour I of Townley Hall, William Burton Conyngham who lived at Slane Castle, and David Jebb, a local miller and engineer, it was constructed 1763-66 at a cost of £19,187 (including the erection of a fine miller’s house). When the English agronomist Arthur Young visited the site in 1776 he described it as ‘138ft long, the breath 54ft and the height to the cornice 42ft, being a large and handsome edifice, such as no mill I have seen in England can compare with it.’ He recorded the mill’s output as being upwards of 17,000 barrels of flour (20 stone each) per annum and the granaries capable of holding 5,000 barrels, making it one of the largest such operations in Europe at the time. The mill was operated by only 10-12 people despite then being the largest of its kind in Europe.

A Survivor


Set into a wall to the immediate west of the main entrance into Mearescourt, County Westmeath is this pedestrian gateway. It appears to be a survivor from the main house at the end of the drive: this was developed over the 17th and 18th century around an earlier tower house and the building’s present front dates from c.1760. Probably when this work was completed and a classic Paladian doorcase installed, the earlier version was removed. However, rather than simply dispose of it, the owners recycled the stone here. So this is a late-Baroque ashlar limestone doorcase with moulded architraves, the cornice supported by carved brackets, a rare survivor from the period although in need of some attention to ensure its future.

Complying with Strict Conditions of Conservation?



In February 2001 the Irish Times reported that Syngefield, County Offaly was being offered for sale. The mid-18th century house had stood vacant for more than two decades, and inevitably was in poor repair as a result. Once surrounded by a substantial amount of land, it now stood on five acres, with factories on either side of the drive, and the outbuildings already sold off. Meanwhile much of the house’s original interior had been either vandalized or stolen – all the chimneypieces were gone, for example – but enough remained, as photographs taken at the time can demonstrate. Most of the main staircase was intact, along with windowcases, lugged architraves, floorboards and some plasterwork. Of particular interest in the Irish Times feature was the information that whoever purchased the property ‘will have to comply with the strict conditions of conservation. Birr Urban District Council sought the advice of the Heritage Council and the property has been assessed by an independent conservation service.’ Hence while the guide price was low – in the region of £150,000 – the costs of bringing Syngefield back to life would be considerably higher.






As is so often the case in Ireland, the origins of Syngefield are unclear. It belonged to a branch of the Synges, cousins of the playwright John Millington Synge, and the house appears to have been built in the middle of the 18th century, perhaps around 1752 when Edward Synge married Sophia Hutchinson. There were many Edward Synges during the Georgian period, almost all of them Anglican clergymen: this one was the grandson of Edward Synge, Archbishop of Tuam and nephew of Edward Synge, Bishop of Elphin and son of Nicholas Synge, Bishop of Killaloe. It was therefore almost inevitable that he too would join the church, becoming archdeacon of Killala, as well as rector of Birr, County Offaly, hence the construction of Syngefield. His eldest son, another Edward, followed the family example and became an Anglican clergyman but a younger son, Robert, became a baronet and it was his family that continued to live in the property. At the time the Synges owned land not just in Offaly but also Counties Meath and Cork. Descendants appear to have remained in residence at Syngefield until c.1870 after which the house was sporadically let, and then sold in the last century.






Syngefield was a curious house, owing to its lop-sided appearance. Of two storeys over a semi-raised basement, it had six bays, that to the furthest left featuring Venetian windows on both ground and first floors, aping one on the upper floor above the entrance doorcase (Another oddity were the Diocletian windows in the basement.) A number of writers have proposed that a matching bay at the other end of the house had been built, thereby completing the symmetry of the façade, but that this was lost in a fire at some unspecified date. However, just as possible is that the original mid-18th century house comprised the five centre bays. The left-hand bay is a later addition, with a match at the other end of the building intended but never built owing to shortage of funds, a not-unusual situation in Ireland. In any case, when a new owner acquired the property in 2002, he decided to finish the house as was once perhaps conceived by tacking a new bay to the right of the existing property. He also doubled the size of Syngefield thanks to a vast extension at the rear that was to include a basement swimming pool, home cinema, ballroom and more bedrooms: readers can judge for themselves whether this work complied, as the Irish Times had reported would be the case, ‘with the strict conditions of conservation.’ This job, said to have cost in the region of €1 million, was never completed, presumably owing to the onset of economic recession, and in October 2009 Syngefield was offered for sale again. There appear to have been no takers, because today the unfinished structure stands with exterior and interior alike bereft of every original feature. How is it that what was intended to be a model of correct conservation came to look like this?

Recalling a Young Man ‘of Good Character’


Down a narrow lane in North County Tipperary can be found Dorrha Church of Ireland church, which dates from the early 1830s and was built with help from the Board of First Fruits. Next to it are the remains of a much older building, now fallen into ruin. On the north wall is set  a large carved tablet commemorating Lord Bernard (died February 1705) together with his wife Eleanor and ‘my beloved son James Kennedy, a young man of good character, died 9 Jan. 1704…’

There are a number of fine tombstones in the surrounding graveyard, such as that above dating from 1778, and also on the east wall of the old church the remains of a blocked-up arched window (it looks as though a tablet immediately below has been removed), above which is a badly weathered carved head.

Just Perfection


The entrance front of Castle Coole, County Fermanagh. The house was designed by James Wyatt, who took over from Richard Johnston (brother of the better-known Francis Johnston), and built between 1789 and 1798 at a cost of £57,000 for Armar Lowry-Corry, first Earl of Belmore. Wyatt never visited the site, but sent over a number of craftsmen from London to supervise the building work, not least the neo-classical exteriors clad in Portland stone (the garden façade is below). Ownership of the property was transferred to the National Trust in 1951.