towers round ireland

Round Tower and Crosses: St. Dermot founded a monastery here which was plundered by the Vikings in 841 and again in 867. Cormac Mac Cuilleannain, the famous scholar, King and Bishop of Cashel, was buried here after his head had been cut off in battle in 908. the monastery was plundered in 1048, and the last known abbot of the monastery died in 1073. Between the entrance gate and the church is a reconstructed Romanesque doorway belonging to a vanished church. The Round Tower was built with...

On the site of a monastery founded by St. MacOlmog, this Round Tower is unique in that the lower part of the tower is hexagonal, and upper part it is round. It has a square-headed doorway. An internal ladder leads to the top which was altered in the last century to make a belfry. Access into the tower is not premitted....

The only remnant of the early monastery founded by St. Mochua (died 657) is a very well-preserved Round Tower, 96 feet high. It is one of the fattest Round Towers in the country. It is unique in that it has a double Romanesque doorway with fine ornamentation including heads with intertwined hair. Bring a pair of binoculars with you to see the detail, as it is high up off the ground. There is also a Romanesque window in the their floor. The dearths of monks in the old monastery are reported...

An old monastery was founded here by St. Finian the Leper in the 7th century. It is referred to as existing in 992, and a stone church here is mentioned in 1044. The western part of the existing church is the oldest. It was finished in 1158 by Auliff Mor na Cuimsionach, a member of the O'Donoghue family, who was buried here in 1166. It has a Romanesque west doorway, with the innermost order plain, and the two outer ones bearing Romanesque decoration. The east window, with a head and a flowe...

There is a somewhat doubtful report that the monastery was following the Benedictine rule in the 8th century. The Vikings burned the monastery in 836 and again in 922. Brian Boru is said to have built one of the churches on the island, while his brother, who died in 1009, was Abbot. Around 1043 a monk at Inishcaltra named Anmchad was ordered to leave the monastery because, as Guest-master, he had offered wine to the monastery's guests without the Abbot's permission. He left for Fulda in Germ...

Blossom Gate. This is the only gate remaining from the medieval town wall of Kilmallock.
The Collegiate Church. The Round Tower of this church may have originally been part of an earlier monastery. The probably 13th century church has three aisles, a chancel and it’s south wall contains a 13th century door. It’s use as by the Church of Ireland had a bearing on the history of the Earls of Desmond; being the place where the ‘Sugan’ Earl surrendered in 1600 and where the 15th Earl attended a...

The monastery at Kells would appear to have been first founded in 804 by monks from St. Colmcille's foundation at Iona who were fleeing from the Viking invasions and seeking a safer place for their treasures. In 877 reliquaries of the saint were transferred to Kells. The monastery was raided by the Vikings in 919, 950 and 969.

The greatest treasure of the monastery - the Book of Kells, now in Trinity College, Dublin - which had possibly been written here in the early 9th century, wa...

In the 17th and 18th centuries Kinsale was an important English naval base. This is reflected in the architecture of the town which, with its 18th century flavour and a whiff of the distant southern shores reached by its mariners, makes Kinsale into the town with what, in my opinion, is the most individual character in the country. In the town and its surroundings are some interesting monuments. St. Multose Church: The present Church of Ireland Parish church, founded probably by de Cogan...

The Cathedral was begun by Ralph of Bristol around 1223, but only the south transept and a part of the tower as well as small portions of the rest of the church date from this period. It was partially restored in the 15th century, and heavily restored int he 19th century when the choir was almost totally rebuilt. In the south transepts are preserved some good medieval tombs (particularly that of Sir Maurice Fitzgerald of Lackagh who died in 1575) and some of the medieval floor-tiles, and in th...

Martello towers get their name from a place in Corsica named Mortella where there was a round tower which proved impregnable when attacked by the English in 1794, twenty-six years after Napoleon's birth on the island.

When, in 1804, it looked as if he might turn the tables and invade England, the English built similar towers around the coast of Ireland which, they feared, Napoleon might use as the 'back door' to England. Though the fears proved groundless, the towers still stand as a m...