Castles and forts in County Laois
The Discover Alone map has 208 castles and forts in County Laois, Ireland. Below are the 60 with the most written about them, pictures first. Every one has its own page with directions and places nearby.
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Water CastleCastleMud and memory tangled in Water Castle, where a Georgian house swallowed a medieval tower instead of replacing it.…
Turrets (in Ruins)BawnMortar crumbled before muscle could break it, yet the west wall still stands two metres high with gun ports cut for…
Tullamoy Castle (ruins)CastleTullamoy Castle stands in ruins across County Laois, its stones stripped of roof and purpose. The site still belongs to…
Tinnakill Castle (in Ruins)Castle — tower houseTinnakill Castle stands as a four-storey limestone ruin in flat Laois countryside, its thick walls and groin vault…
Timahoe AbbeyCastle — tower houseTimahoe Abbey began as an O'More foundation before the Cosbys fortified the sacred ground into a tower house during the…
The MoundCastle — motte and baileyKilmorony’s mound is a 6m high earthen castle in County Laois, possibly an older enclosure refortified by…
Site of CastleCastle — unclassifiedTimogue castle vanished beneath river silt and memory, leaving only a mill ghost beside the graveyard. The water kept…
Site of CastleCastle — unclassifiedGrange Upper castle vanished into undulating Laois countryside, leaving no stones, ditches or mounds behind. It…
Site of CastleCastle — unclassifiedGash castle stood on high ground above the River Nore, guarding a march where Irish war kept twenty-nine carucates…
Site of CastleCastle — unclassifiedEmo Park in County Laois lost its castle walls before human memory faded, leaving only a map label behind. The site…
Site of CastleCastle — unclassifiedBallynahimmy castle once held a narrow ridge above the northern valley, but time and perhaps deliberate erasure reduced…
Site of Ballymanus CastleCastle — unclassifiedBallymanus Castle stood in a low-lying area beside the river in County Laois, dependent on Dunamase and marked on the…
Shaen Castle (in Ruins)Castle — tower houseShaen Castle stood as a tower house on a hill summit until its destruction in 1650, leaving behind only a projecting…
Scotch RathHouse — fortified houseScotch Rath stands on a ridge above the river as a rectangular limestone ruin, its bawn wall still casting a shadow…
Roskeen Castle (in Ruins)Castle — tower houseRoskeen Castle stood as an L-shaped tower house on high ground in County Laois, marked clearly on the 1841 edition of…
Rock of Dunamase, Castle (in Ruins)Castle — Anglo-Norman masonry castleRock of Dunamase Castle is an Anglo-Norman masonry fortress on a rocky outcrop in County Laois, Ireland, built in…
Partiall hachuredBawnBallynahimmy is a subrectangular bawn in County Laois, Ireland, with banks on three sides, a scarp at the south, a…
OutlinedCastle — Anglo-Norman masonry castleCastletown castle stood on high ground above the River Nore, holding twenty-nine carucates and sixty acres for the Earl…
OutlinedCastle — unclassifiedCoolroe hides a castle ghost beneath a quiet cottage roof. Local memory claims the house was built inside the lost bawn…
Old Barrack, Mill LandCastle — unclassifiedFort Protector rose in 1548 on O'More land, its angular walls and water-filled ditch designed to hold Maryborough…
New Castle in ruinsCastle — unclassifiedNew Castle in Farnans, County Laois, vanished around 2000 after appearing on maps since 1841. The land now holds only a…
Morett Castle (in ruins)House — fortified houseMorett Castle rose as a four-storey Fitzgerald stronghold around 1580, perched on a rock outcrop to watch the land in…
Mondrehid CastleCastle — tower houseMondrehid Castle stood as a tower house in County Laois until ruin claimed it before the 1654 Down Survey. John…
Moat of SkirkeCastle — motte and baileySkirke is a castle built inside an older henge, where a standing stone still marks the centre of the bailey. The…
MoatCastle — motte and baileyOboy is the local name for Castletown, where Strongbow gave Ui Buidhe to Robert de Bigarz before 1176 and Hugh de Lacy…Middlemount MoatCastle — motte and baileyMiddlemount Moat rises as a flat-topped cone above the flat Laois countryside, preserving the angular memory of an…
Mail Coach StablesCastle — unclassifiedKilminchy Castle fell into obscurity, but its stones reappeared inside later buildings, including the Mail Coach…
Lea Castle (in ruins)Castle — Anglo-Norman masonry castleMaurice FitzPhilip lost Lega to Gerald fitzMaurice in 1199, triggering a century of contested ownership that produced…
Killeshin MoatCastle — motteKilleshin Moat rises eight metres above the Laois ridge, its scarped base and thorn-choked summit hiding a castle that…
Killeany Castle (ruins)CastleKilleany Castle stands in ruins across County Laois, its stones scattered rather than stacked into a proud wall. The…
Kilbreedy CastleCastleKilbreedy Castle was the O'Phelan stronghold on a low Laois ridge, holding its ground until the mid-seventeenth…
IndicatedBawnIndicated, Srahanboy is a ruined tower house in County Laois where O'Connors lived in 1641 and Calcutt in 1775 before…
IndicatedCastle — unclassifiedClopook is an unclassified castle hidden inside a large hilltop enclosure in County Laois, Ireland. The hillfort has a…
Gortnaclea Castle (ruins)CastleGortnaclea Castle stands in ruin within County Laois, its stones stripped of roof and purpose. The site may have served…
Durrow CastleCastleDurrow Castle is a castle in County Laois, Ireland. Perhaps its walls still hold the shape of hands that built them…
Donaghmore MoatCastle — motteDonaghmore Moat is a steep earthen cone at the north end of a Laois ridge, still standing seven metres high with a…
Donaghmore Castle ruinsCastleDonaghmore Castle ruins stands in County Laois, a broken castle whose exact history has faded from public memory. The…
Coolkerry Castle (in ruins)Castle — unclassifiedCoolkerry Castle vanished completely, leaving only a low hillock with a shallow depression beside the Erkina River.…
ConventCastle — tower houseConvent, Maryborough is a circular stone tower house standing behind the Convent in Portlaoise, marked within the town…
Clonreher CastleCastleClonreher Castle is a four-storey greywacke tower house in County Laois, built by the O'Dowlings before John Dunkirley…
Cloncourse CastleHouse — fortified houseCloncourse Castle rose in four rubble-storeys above County Laois in 1636, its central tower projecting like a fist…
Clonburren Castle (ruins)CastleClonburren Castle stands in ruin across County Laois, its stones stripped of roof and purpose. What remains is a…
Clogrenan CastleCastle — tower houseClogrenan Castle guarded a vital River Barrow crossing on the Laois-Carlow border, surviving Carew's 1569 siege only to…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedTen metres of sandstone wall still brace the ravine edge where Tinnahinch Castle stood, reduced to a low scar beside a…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedCastle, unclassified in Kyle (clandonagh By., Kyle South Ed) is a castle within Kyle (clandonagh By., Kyle South Ed)…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedCastlequarter still marks the lost site of Skirke castle, though no wall or trench remains for a visitor to touch. It…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedCastlefleming took its name from a castle that vanished so completely it never appeared on official maps. The building…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedCastle, unclassified in Ballymaddock (stradbally By.) stands in County Laois, Ireland. Local memory holds that dynamite…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedDown Survey mapped a ruined castle in Ballicalo during the middle of the 17th century, yet no exact remains are listed…
CastleCastle — unclassifiedCastle Townparks (Clandonagh By.) stands in Borris in Ossory, where rough unhewn walls still rise thirty feet above the…
CastleCastle — ringworkCastle, ringwork in Rathpiper South is a castle ringwork in County Laois, Ireland. Pipard, a descendant of Adam de…
CastleCastle — ringworkCastle, ringwork in Lea stands in low ground beside the Barrow, where floodwater still touches the north bawn. Its…
CastleCastle — motteCastle, motte in Kildellig is a square castle mound in County Laois, Ireland. It rises about 4m with a summit near 9m…
CastleCastle — motteHaywood Demesne holds a circular earthen mound with a flat top, possibly marked by faint ditches at its south-east and…
CastleCastle — motteCastle, motte in Grenan is a large oval mound with two raised platforms, a wide cutting around most of it, and an…
CastleCastle — motteCastle, motte in Dunbrin Lower is a damaged oval mound beside the River Barrow, marked by a low bank and flat fosse.…
CastleCastle — motteCastle, motte in Clonenagh stands as a circular earth platform twenty-three metres wide and two and a half metres high…
CastleCastle — motteCastle, motte in Ballyroan (cullenagh By.) stands as a seven-metre mound above a water-filled trench, marking the…
CastleCastle — motte and baileyCastle, motte and bailey in Srahanboy is a gently sloping flat-topped mound about 3.5m high inside a D-shaped raised…
CastleCastle — motte and baileyCooltedery in County Laois holds a forgotten double castle where two mottes faced each other across a narrow neck…