What is recorded here

Castle field in Broghill North holds no stones above ground, though a 1909 photograph caught masonry stumps on a raised platform before reclamation erased them around 1955. The site belonged to the Earls of Desmond, passed to Hugh Cuffe in 1597, and later became the property of Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, who may have built the mansion marked on the Down Survey. A castle can vanish into pasture while its name remains sharp in the field, waiting for someone to walk the slope and remember what the land stopped showing.

In pasture, on slight N-facing slope. No visible surface trace of castle. Photograph taken in 1909 (Grove White 1905-25, vol. 1, 316) shows several stumps of masonry on raised platform; according to local information, these were levelled during land reclamation c. 1955; field known as 'castle field'. Castle of the Earls of Desmond, granted to Hugh Cuffe in 1597 as part of Munster Plantation (ibid., 317), subsequently acquired by Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, who probably built mansion depicted here on Down Survey (1655-6) (1655-6) barony map. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Cork. Volume 4: North Cork' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 2000). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. Date of upload/revision: 14 January 2009

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