Brittas Castle

Detached castle, built c.1830, and unfinished except for front elevation and lower parts of other walls. Polygonal battlemented towers to corners of front elevation. Ashlar limestone walls with battered base. Round-arch loop windows, with double-ogee light to west side of front part. Machicolations to towers and west wall. Four-centred-arch entranceway, with chamfered surrounds and with slots for portcullis. Castle surrounded by moat.

Built by Major Henry Langley, this castle was intended to be the first nineteenth-century 'archaeological' castle in Ireland. Designed by William Vitruvius Morrison, work was abandoned in 1834 when Langley was struck by a falling stone on site and killed. The building retains many of its original interior and exterior features, including a dungeon and a working moat. The finely-cut limestone masonry used throughout the building attests to the skill of the nineteenth-century craftsmen and stone masons. Brittas Castle forms an imposing and striking silhouette on the surrounding countryside.