castles historical wexford

Rathumney is a hall-castle of a type common in the 13th and 14th centuries. The centre of the building was occupied by a hall, two storeys high, off which opened living rooms with fireplaces.

There is a tower at the south-eastern corner of the castle. Practically all the decorated stonework has been removed, but gently rounded arches still span the larger door and window openings. Little is known of the history of the castle other than that it was probably built by the Prendergasts....

A castle probably erected by John Rosseter who was made Seneschal of the Liberties of Wexford in 1451, and whose family remained Catholics although they recognised Henry VIII in the 16th century. The tower stands in the south-eastern corner of a well-preserved bawn. The tower is five storeys high, and has battlements which are typical of the 15th and 16th centuries in Ireland.

The bawn wall is about 4 feet thick and 24 feet high, with a round turret at the north-eastern corner and a l...

Slade castle was built in two stages. The first was the tower at the northern end, built probably by one of the Laffan family in the late 15th or early 16th century. The tower is 56 feet high and is battlemented, and there is a fireplace and a cupboard in a room on the third storey.

The second stage was the addition of a house in the 16th or early 17th century. The house is not as high as the tower and has simple moulded windows on the first floor.

At the east end of the ho...

Once a flourishing medieval town, Clonmines still contains the remains of some of its old buildings. The town was given a charter by William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, early in the 13th century, and the Kavanagh family founded an Abbey here for the Augustinian Eremites which was 'beautified' and enlarged in 1385.

The town was destroyed in 1400, but rose again. Although it scarcely survived the 17th century, it continued to send members to Parliament up till 1800. Nevertheless, as l...