What is recorded here

Knockainy West once held a ruinous dovecote inside the stone bawn of Black Castle on the Camoge River bank. The Desmond Survey of 1586 described the wall and dovecote as being in great decay, while the nearby Town Green still marked the manor’s identity. That much is known; the rest belongs to imagination. Perhaps people still walk past the buried castle, unaware that dove holes and broken walls sleep beneath the grass.

Medieval dovecote located inside the bawn (LI032-141014-) of Black Castle (LI032-141002-) also known as Desmond Castle. No surface remains visible of the castle, bawn or dovecote which stood on elevated ground on the W bank of the Camoge River. The 'Town Green' of the Manor of Aney [Knockainey] was located in the field immediately W of the Black Castle as depicted on the 1657 Down Survey map (NLI MS 718). The dovecote was described in the Desmond Survey of 1586 as following; 'A castle [LI032-141002-) there ruinous within except its stone walls with a large area or inclosure called in English "a Balne" [LI032-141014-) surrounded with a stony wall a dovecote within the precincts of the bawn (the wall and dovecote being in great decay)' (Murphy 2013, 151). Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien Date of upload: 12 June 2019

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