Burnt Out

Jul4

Although the Everard family is said to have come to Ireland around 1177, only from the fifteenth century onwards does it come to prominence as effective owner of the town of Fethard, County Tipperary, and of the surrounding territory. In 1578 John Everard entered the Inner Temple and twelve years later was called to the Bar, being appointed justice of the Court of King’s Bench (Ireland) in 1602 and subsequently knighted. As evidence of his authority in this part of the country, in 1608 he secured the new charter for Fethard from the English crown, according to the terms of which the town’s Corporation was renewed and enlarged, ‘and was endowed with such liberties and privileges as were needed to draw more people to the town and to increase its trade and commerce.’ The previous year Sir John had surrendered all his property to the English authorities, and then received it back again, evidence of the esteem in which he was held. What makes this notable is that the Everards were, and remained, adherents of the Roman Catholic faith. As a judge he was expected to take the Oath of Allegiance to the crown but, his conscience making this impossible, he resigned the position. Ultimately the Everards’ loyalty to the old religion would lead to tragedy, but first came farce. In 1613 the only Irish Parliament held during the reign of James I was called, to which Sir Jhn was returned as member of the House of Commons for Tipperary. He was the Catholic choice for the position of Speaker of the House of Commons, but they were iin a minority, the government’s choice being Sir John Davies, Attorney General for Ireland. When the vote was taken, Sir John Everard installed himself in the Speaker’s chair and refused to move. According to a contemporary source, ‘Sir Thomas Ridgway, Sir Richard Wingfield, Sir Oliver St John and others, brought Sir John Davies to the chair, and lifted him into Sir John Everard’s lap; the Knights perceiving Sir John Everard would not give place to their speaker, they lifted Sir John Everard out of the chair, and some of Sir John Everard’s part holding him by the collar of the gown to keep him in the chair…’ Ultimately this undignified incident ended in Everard’s defeat, not least because Sir John Davies was a much heavier man who literally crushed his opponent by sitting on top of him.

Despite his embarrassing setback over occupation of the Speaker’s chair in the House of Commons – after which he was temporarily imprisoned in the Tower of London – Sir John Everard continued to flourish, to remain in possession of his lands, and of a judicial pension, and to practice as a Roman Catholic until his death in 1624. He had three sons, the most prominent being the middle child Richard who even while his father was still alive was created a baronet. Like his father Sir Richard remained resolutely Roman Catholic, and as before this brought him into difficulties with the English authorities, especially after the Confederate War began in Ireland in 1641. It seems that initially Sir Richard ‘kept aloof from both parties; but for not joining with them, the “old” Irish took away from him “160 cows, 33 stud mares, and 2,000 sheep.” The tenants on his Estate were subject to similar treatment: the richest of whom with their flocks and goods Sir Richard conveyed to “safe quarters”.’ This account continues, ‘Later on, when the object of the Catholic Confederation was clearly known and defined, Sir Richard readily joined the popular movement, and in 1646 was one of the Confederate Catholics who sat in what might be designated the “Irish Parliament at Kilkenny”.’ Following Oliver Cromwell’s arrival in this country in 1649, Sir Richard was one of the leaders of the opposing Confederate army. He was involved in defending Limerick against the Cromwellian forces but following the city’s surrender was one of those hanged by Henry Ireton.

Before strife once again overwhelmed Ireland, Sir Richard embarked on building a new residence in the midst of a fertile plain lying between the Galtee Mountains and the small town of Clogheen, County Tipperary. Commonly called Everard’s Castle, this has at its centre a substantial four-bay, three-storey over basement rectangular block with square flanking towers of four storeys (again over basement) at each of the corners. This is the last of a group of such semi-fortified houses, beginning with Rathfarnham Castle, County Dublin built for Archbishop Adam Loftus in the late 1580s (see A Whiter Shade of Pale, August 26th 2013) and taking in others like Kanturk Castle, County Cork (see An Abandoned Project, December 7th 2015), Leamaneagh Castle, County Clare and Portumna Castle, County Galway. However, whereas many of these were castellated, Everard’s Castle is notable for its gables, all twenty six of them: it would also have had seven chimney stacks. It is, therefore, closer to the English model of manor house than the familiar Irish tower house, and suggests Sir Richard was expecting years of peace, not war, to follow. On the other hand, deep corbels above the first-floor windows were intended to carry a defensive wooden gallery, so he must have reckoned with the possibility that his new property would be subject to attack. The front has a low door placed asymmetrically which again suggests certain caution on the part of the original builder. However one of the other sides of the house features a finer and larger cut stone doorcase with hood mould and carved decoration. And there are many two- and three-mullioned windows throughout the structure, which would have made it much lighter and airier than was the norm in this country at the time.

A stone formerly over the entrance but now elsewhere on the site carries the date 1641, presumably the year in which work on Everard’s Castle was completed. The family was not to enjoy occupation for long. After a couple of years Sir Richard became embroiled in the Confederate Wars and, as has been mentioned, was hanged by Ireton in 1651. The year before, as Cromwell’s army advanced south Lady Everard set the house on fire, rather than allow it fall into enemy hands: it has stood a ruin ever since, and became known as Burncourt (or sometimes Burntcourt). Legend has it the building took seven years to build, was occupied for seven years and took seven days to burn. As for the family, following Sir Richard’s death they forfeited their lands but these were restored to his eldest son Sir Redmond Everard following the restoration of Charles II in 1660. In turn his son, Sir John Everard, was attainted for supporting James II, and although some of the family property was subsequently returned, their baronetcy and presence in this part of Ireland ended with the death of another Sir Redmond Everard around 1740. In 1751 the Fethard territories were sold to wealthy Bordeaux wine merchant Thomas Barton, while the area around Burncourt was acquired by a Dublin lawyer, Cornelius O’Callaghan. His great-grandson, another Cornelius O’Callaghan who was created first Viscount Lismore, was responsible for building another immense castle nearby: Shanbally designed by John Nash. Notoriously this was blown up by the Irish Land Commission in 1960. So while Shanbally is gone, Burncourt remains, thereby providing a partial memory of Tipperary’s architectural heritage.

Pray for the Soul

Jul2

Like many other religious sites, the former Franciscan friary at Ross Errilly, County Galway continued to serve as a burial site long after it had officially been put out of commission during the 16th century Reformation. Later visitors often commented on the poorly interred bodies here: in 1851 the Rev. John Hervey Ashworth claimed he had counted no less than sixty skulls scattered about the semi-ruinous buildings (see To Walk the Studious Cloisters Pale, July 14th 2014). Today there are no corpses to be seen, but many handsome tombstones inserted into the mediaeval walls, such as the two examples seen here dating from the early 18th century.

Accommodating the Dead

Jun25

The remains of the old church at Ballykelly, County Derry, a building which suffered from successive assaults – it is known to have been badly damaged in both the 1640s and the 1690s – but continued to be used for religious services until 1795 when a new church was built not far away. Internally its most significant remaining feature is the sandstone semicircular arch presumably added in 1719 when the church was extended by the addition of a chancel. More peculiarly in 1848 the south wall of the church was taken down to accommodate one end of a large neo-classical mausoleum dedicated to the Cather family, with its oversized anthemion acroteria at each corner. Unfortunately this monument’s poor condition suggests it could soon go the same way as the adjacent ruined church.

The Curfew Tolls the Knell of Parting Day

Jun20

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed,
The cock’s shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire’s return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
Awaits alike the inevitable hour.
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Lines taken from Thomas Gray’s ‘Elegy Written in a Country Graveyard’ (1751).
Photographs are of the now-abandoned St Mary’s Church, Mocollop, County Waterford.

Overlooked

Jun8

Passing through Cashel, County Tipperary the majority of visitors likely hasten to see the collection of ecclesiastical buildings known as the Rock and then move on, meaning the rest of the town is unexplored. One of the sites that they will literally have overlooked while on the Rock is the Dominican Friary, tucked in the midst of backstreets and rarely sighted. Founded in 1243 by Archbishop David MacKelly, the original building was destroyed by fire but then rebuilt in 1480, when the central tower was added. This survives today as do the outer walls of the church, including the fine fifteenth century east window seen below.

The Fertile Rock

May30

‘The quest for earthly solitude was the chief motive behind the foundation of Citeaux in 1098 and the statutes of the order later insisted that “monasteries should not be built in cities, castles or towns but in places far removed from the conversation of men.” Hidden in the quiet of the countryside, the monks could pursue without distraction their search for spiritual union with God. The advantages of rural retreat were beautifully summarised by the English abbot, Aelred as he described the attractions of Cistercian life: “everywhere peace, everywhere serenity and a marvelous freedom from the tumult of the world”.’ From Roger Stalley’s The Cistercian Monasteries of Ireland (1987)

The Cistercian abbey at Corcomroe, County Clare is believed to have been founded towards the end of the 12th century at the behest either of Domnall Mór Ua Briain, King of Thomond or of his son Donnchadh Cairprech. The location is curious since as a rule the Cistercians always chose a spot beside running water. Here however there is no evidence or either a river or stream but perhaps it existed then and has since disappeared. Dedicated to the Virgin Mary, the monastery’s Latin name was ‘Petra Fertilis’ or Fertile Rock, suggesting the land was sufficiently well watered at the time. Work began on the site around 1205 and it is clear from the eastern end of the church nave that the monks held high ambitions for this monastery: as Stalley writes, ‘those in charge intended to produce the finest looking Cistercian church in Ireland.’ The chancel arch is of finely dressed limestone with the capitals well carved: inside is some handsome ribbed vaulting. There are well carved sedile on the north and south walls of the chancel, the former also features a wall plaque depicting an abbot and directly below him the tomb of the founder’s grandson Conor na Siudane Ua Briain, who died in 1267. It shows the deceased lying recumbent and wearing a crown decorated with fleur de lys, his left hand holding a sceptre, his right a reliquary suspended from the chain around his neck. On either side of the chancel are single transept chapels each approached via its own arch with beautifully carved colonettes featuring floral and animal motifs.

Changing circumstances put paid to the monks’ architectural ambitions. The Annals of Connacht would later record of 1227: ‘Famine throughout Ireland this year, and much sickness and death among men from various causes: cold, famine and every kind of disease.’ Political unrest before and after the catastrophe further added to the monastery’s problems and as a result the high standard of workmanship seen at the eastern end of the church was abandoned. Undressed stone was used for the rest of the building and the arches of the nave are arranged in haphazard fashion, suggesting the main intent was to finish work rather than worry about decoration or polish. Numbers of monks would later drop and eventually the church itself was foreshortened by the insertion of a wall surmounted by a bell turret halfway down the nave: the windows below this point look then to have been blocked up. In the aftermath of the Reformation, the monastery was granted in 1554 to Murrough O’Brien, Earl of Thomond, a descendant of the original founder. Although John O’Dea was named titular abbot as late as 1628 long before that date the place had ceased to be occupied by the Cistercians.

The Past in Need of a Future

May23

While claims are made of 12th century origins, in its present form Lackeen Castle, County Tipperary is an example of the later Irish tower house. These defensive dwellings were built from the 15th to early 17th centuries, and it would appear that Lackeen was constructed for Brian Ua Cinneide Fionn, chieftain of Ormond, who died in 1588. Cinneide is the Irish word for ‘Helmeted Head’, it being said that the Ua Cinneides were the first people in this country to wear helmets when going into battle against the Vikings. The name was later anglicised to Kennedy and the family remains widespread in this part of north Tipperary. Although Brian Ua Cinneide Fionn’s son Donnchadh further fortified the castle, in 1653 it surrendered to English forces. Nevertheless his descendants regained possession of the property and were in occupation in the 18th century. Lackeen is of particular interest since it forms part of a group of buildings constructed within a bawn wall, considerable parts of which also survive. The tower house is of four storeys, and contains the remains of several chimneypieces as well as two flights of stairs, initially a straight run to the first floor, and then a spiral staircase to the upper levels concluding in a large open space which was once roofed and would have held the main living chambers.

As mentioned, the original owners of Lackeen had regained possession of the site by the 18th century. In 1735 John O’Kennedy who was then undertaking work on the tower house discovered an ancient manuscript hidden inside one of its walls. Known as the Stowe Missal the work was written in Latin in the late eighth or early ninth century but in the mid-11th century had been annotated and some additional pages written in Irish. By that date the manuscript seems to have come into the safe keeping of a monastery at nearby Lorrha where it would have remained until the dissolution of such establishments in the mid-16th century; most likely the manuscript was then concealed for safekeeping at Lackeen Castle. Following its rediscovery the missal entered the collection of the Irish antiquarian Charles O’Conor, the O’Conor Don. In 1798 his grandson, a Roman Catholic priest also called Charles O’Conor, was invited to become chaplain to the first Marchioness of Buckingham, and to organize and translate a collection of historic material kept at her husband’s house, Stowe in Buckinghamshire. On moving to England, the younger O’Conor brought with him fifty-nine of his grandfather’s manuscripts including the missal found at Lackeen. Along with the others, this remained at Stowe until the entire collection was sold to the fourth Earl of Ashburnham in 1849: in turn his son sold all the manuscripts to the British government which returned Irish-related material to this country. The Stowe missal is now in the possession of the Royal Irish Academy.

Adjacent to Lackeen Castle and on the edge of the bawn wall is a group of domestic buildings which look to be from the 17th and early 18th centuries: it would seem at least some of this cluster was erected in the aftermath of 1660 when peace, for a time, returned to Ireland. The most striking, and most intact, of the group is a two-storey, five-bay farmhouse, one-room deep, with a single living space on either side of the entrance hall. The latter is interesting because on coming through the front door one faces a pair of panelled doors, that to the left leading to the staircase (now in part collapsed) that to the right being a cupboard. This decorative flourish, together with simple plasterwork on the ceilings of the ground floor rooms suggest aspirations towards gentry status on the part of the earliest occupants, and make Lackeen House all the more important since such buildings are now relatively rare. In the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage, the building’s association with the adjacent tower house is described as being ‘of great importance and illustrates the development of this site for domestic use over several centuries.’ Photographs taken only a few years ago show the house unoccupied but still in reasonable condition. Unfortunately such is no longer the case: there are holes in the roof where slates have slipped, resultant water ingress has led to partial ceiling collapse, a portion of the stairs has given way and the signs are that Lackeen House will soon be just an empty shell. This is a s0-called ‘Protected Structure’ but once again the term is meaningless as no protection is being offered to the house. Time is running out fast here: unless an intervention occurs soon a nationally important collection of historic buildings is set to be lose one of its key elements.

Craic des Chevaliers

Apr11

Pottering about the back lanes of County Louth, one’s attention is suddenly arrested by a limestone outcrop on which are the remains of a once-substantial fortification. This is Castle Roche, the name of which suggests that it was built by a northerly branch of the Roche family members of which are mostly found in Counties Wexford and Cork. Actually the origin of the castle’s title is more complex, as is the history of its construction. The building is believed to date from the 13th century and to have been erected by the Anglo-Norman de Verduns. An ancestor, Bertram de Verdun had come to England in 1066 as a retainer of Count Robert of Mortain, one of William the Conqueror’s principal commanders at the Battle of Hastings. His grandson, another Bertram, was appointed seneschal for the visit of Henry II to Ireland in 1171 and this was the beginning of the de Verduns’ association with this country. Bertram would die at Jaffa in 1192 while participating in the Third Crusade, but his son Nicholas inherited the family estates and especially after marrying Joan Fitz-Piers who likewise came into land in Ireland he spent much of his time here. The couple had a daughter, Rohesia de Verdun, and she is traditionally credited with building Castle Roche.

Rohesia de Verdun was a considerable heiress, so it is not surprising that she should have become linked to another important Anglo-Norman family in Ireland, in 1225 marrying as his second wife Theobold le Boteler, a forebear of the Butler family. However by this time she already had a son, John de Verdun, perhaps the offspring of an illicit marriage or affair. It was John de Verdun, and not the children of Rohesia’s marriage to Theobold le Boteler, who would eventually inherit his mother’s Irish estates. In the meantime, she had become a widow, her husband dying in 1230 during an expedition to Gascony. Six years later, she is said to have undertaken the construction of a mighty fortress on her lands in what is now County Louth. Its name, Castle Roche, derives from a corruption of her own, Rohesia. It is likely that John de Verdun added much to the work his mother had begun, not least because in 1242 she founded the Augustinian Priory of Gracedieu near Thringstone in Leicestershire. This house is believed to have been the only one of its kind in England and, in line with the independent character of its founder, the nuns were independent of outside control. Rohesia died there five years after establishing the house. A persistent legend about Castle Roche may explain why she decided to become a member of a religious community. Although the Magna Carta enshrined in law that no widow could be compelled to remarry, it was not unusual for the crown to insist on such unions for various political and fiscal reasons. If she had taken another husband, Rohesia would have weakened the likelihood of her son John inheriting the family estates intact. It is said that she declared her intention only to marry the man who could build a castle to her satisfaction. Someone duly did so, but on their wedding night, as he showed his new bride the spectacular view from a window on the west side, she pushed him through it. Thereafter at Castle Roche it was known as the Murder Window.

Built on the edge of a steep cliff, the plan of Castle Roche is almost triangular, this unusual form being dictated by the nature of the site. Rock formations provide protection to east, west, north and south so that the only access to the building lies on its easterly side. This was controlled by a bailey separated from the castle by a rock cut ditch. Entry to the castle was gained through the bailey, across a bridge over the ditch and through an arched gateway between two bastion towers. Like the battlemented curtain walls, these towers feature a series of slits through which arrows could be fired at the approaching enemy. Inside, the remains of a two-storey great hall can be found in the south-east corner, but otherwise little survives of any permanent structure as this was predominantly a walled enclosure. Castle Roche survived for several centuries. A meeting of all the English forces in Ireland took place here in 1561 but the building was devastated eighty years later during the Confederate Wars and has remained a ruin ever since. Given its dramatic position and relatively decent state of preservation, Castle Roche seems surprisingly little known. Last year the state tourist board launched an initiative called Ireland’s Ancient East designed to encourage more visitors to this part of the country. Castle Roche ought to feature in proposed itineraries but doesn’t. A missed opportunity – but at least those of us who come across the place can be confident of having it to ourselves.

Lost and Found

Apr2

Like many words in the English language, ‘lost’ is open to diverse use. It can, for example, mean missing or misplaced but just as often is employed to denote something that has vanished, perished or been destroyed. Such is the case with an engrossing – albeit chastening – book recently published, Lost Ireland: 1860-1960. Author William Derham has trawled through thousands of photographs to select 500 images of buildings throughout the island, the majority of which have entirely disappeared or else been so altered/mutilated that they no longer bear any semblance to their original state.

In a thoughtful introductory essay, Derham provides an historical context for why so many older buildings in Ireland should come to have been lost and laments the disappearance of certain building types such as the early unfortified house represented by Eyrecourt, County Galway: dating from the second half of the 17th century and still intact less than 100 years ago, it is now a roofless shell. Likewise Ireland has no examples of the ‘cagework’ urban house in which the frame would be of wood and the spaces between filled with wattle and daub. The last of these to survive, in Dublin on the corner of Castle and Werburgh Streets, was demolished as long ago as 1812. Likewise the once-widespread brick gabled townhouses known as Dutch Billies are now almost extinct, or else subsumed into later buildings.

Some losses – notably among the ranks of the Irish country house – are already well-known, but even here Derham finds examples likely to be unfamiliar to most readers, and explains the shameful role played in the erosion of their number by that state body the Land Commission. However he covers many other areas of depletion and, frankly, dissipation, such as the damage inflicted on Roman Catholic churches and cathedrals in the aftermath of the second Vatican Council. Using the excuse of a new liturgy, members of the Irish clergy stripped interiors of the buildings for which they were responsible: one of the most egregious examples being the gutting of Pugin’s Killarney Cathedral at the instigation of then-bishop Eamon Casey. Tellingly their clerical equivalents in other countries did not feel impelled to engage in similar acts of vandalism. But valuable secular buildings were also squandered for no good reason, such as the demolition in 1964 of a fine mid-18th century market house in Mountrath, County Laois – supposedly because a public lavatory was needed (although this was never built). As much as an exhortation to protect what remains as a requiem to what has gone, this is a beautifully produced book and allows us to find again, if only in photographic form, what has been lost. Do acquire a copy while you can as it is certain to sell out.

Lost Ireland: 1860-1960 by William Derham is published by Hyde Park Editions, price £39.95/€49.95. The photographs above were taken at a recent exhibition in Dublin Castle to coincide with the launch of the book. They show (from top), Roxborough Castle, County Tyrone (burnt 1922), Longford Castle, Longford (demolished 1972), Woodstock, County Kilkenny (burnt 1922) and Ballynastragh, County Wexford (burnt 1923). The exhibition has now ended but deserves to travel to other venues around the country in coming months; why not encourage your local arts centre/library to borrow it?

House of Stone

Mar19

Duleek, County Meath derives its name from the Irish words daimh liag meaning house of stone and is, it seems, the oldest known reference to such a church being made from stone rather than wood. A monastery was founded here in the fifth century by St Cianán, a disciple of St Patrick, but the ruins of St Mary’s Augustinian priory seen here date from the 12th and 13th centuries, with the large tower at the west end erected in the 15th century at a time when churches and monasteries were subject to attack. An adjacent early 19th century Anglican church no longer serves its intended purpose but has been converted into a restaurant.

The Irish Aesthete

This is not an Oxymoron

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