Castle — unclassified in Ballycarbery East

Tradition attributes the building of this castle to one Carbery O'Shea (Chatterton 1839, 285), but it is more firmly associated with the MacCarthys. Some form of residence appears to have stood at Ballycarbery in 1398 when Taghd Mac Carthaigh's death there is recorded in the annals (Ó hInnse 1947, 113), but the existing ruins are later in date and are probably those of 'the castle of Valencyen called Ballycarborow', referred to in a document of 1569 (Cal Car MSS 1569, 389). It is noted as a MacCarthy More castle in 1594 (King 1910, 215). Other sixteenth-century sources indicate that it was occupied by the O’Connells in their capacity as MacCarthy wardens (Fiants Eliz No’s. 488,6469, 6569); one Morgan O’Connell of Ballycarbery, for instance, became High Sheriff of Kerry during Elizabethan times. Possession of the castle passed to Sir Valentine Browne following the death of Daniel MacCarthy More - the Earl of Clancar - in 1596 (Hussey 1916a, 252). It appears to have been slighted by parliament forces in 1651-52, when Valencia Harbour was being fortified (Stalley 1991, 127). The castle is located on a slight eminence on the N shore of the tidal estuary of the River Ferta, just E of Valencia Harbour. Dated by Leask to the fifteenth century (1973, 157), it comprises a fine, ivy-covered tower house surrounded by the remains of a bawn. Much of the S and E walls of both the keep and bawn are destroyed, presumably due to the mid-seventeenth-century slighting, though a portion of the bawn at S was dismantled and removed in the early twentieth century (Cochrane 1910, 57). A pair of early nineteenth-century watercolours of the castle by Daniel Grose depict large masses of faced masonry lying on its S and E sides (PI. XXVIII; Stalley 1991, No. 53); most of these were also removed in the early twentieth century. The tower house is rectangular in plan and measures 22.5m x 12.9m; there is an attached turret at its NE corner. Built of roughly coursed blocks, slabs and split stone rubble laid in a lime, pebble and stone-chip mortar, the walls display a low but prominent base batter. The undressed quoins are alternately face-bedded. The building is of three storeys, with vaults roofing the first floor level. Communication with the second floor, which appears to have formed the hall of the castle, was by means of two sets of mural stairs. It has a series of fine windows with limestone dressings, but many of the stepped merlons are missing. The entrance is at ground level and is located off-centre to the N wall. Here the batter of the wall is interrupted to accommodate a 1.75m wide round-headed doorway, arched with pitched stones; its E jamb does not survive, but two drawbar sockets occur opposite. A shallow groove on the upper surface of one of the W jamb-stones may represent the housing for the hinge of a yett. The vault of the small entrance lobby is of pitched stone and traces of the wooden framework which supported its centring are visible; it is pierced by a portcullis groove which was served from the second floor window embrasure. A straight mural stair leads E from the lobby to the first and second floors of the building. The stair is approached through a poorly preserved doorway, only the S jamb of which survives. This is formed from well-cut ashlar blocks and immediately behind it two iron stumps, probably the remains of butt-hinges, are set in the S wall of the stair lobby. The entrance lobby communicates with the central ground floor chamber through a tall, segmental headed doorway with jambs of roughly cut blocks. The door was secured from within by a pair of drawbars for which both the sockets and channels are preserved. The ground floor of the building was divided into three transversely disposed chambers with average dimensions of 7.15m x 4.95m. Only that at W is intact. The first floor was accommodated beneath the pointed vaults of these chambers, which were constructed on wicker centring. The two dividing walls and the single surviving end-wall at ground floor level are pierced by a number of holes. The central chamber was lit by a window in the S wall, of which traces of the embrasure ingoing survive. Access to the W chamber is through a round-headed doorway which was built askew; it is fitted with an internal drawbar channel and socket. Traces of plastering survive in this chamber, which was lit by a loop set in a large vaulted embrasure in the N wall. A doorway is accommodated in its W ingoing and interrupts the vault; through it access is gained to another mural stair which leads to second floor level. Beam sockets in the embrasure ingoing may have supported a short wooden stair to give access to this doorway. A large blocked embrasure with a segmental rear arch occurs in the S wall of the chamber, and two large wall-cupboards occur in the W wall; the larger features a relieving arch overhead. The E chamber was probably entered through a doorway in the largely destroyed wall which separated it from the central chamber. In its NE corner is an ope, set low down, through which access was gained into a downward-sloping, blocked mural passage which appears to have led into the foundation area of the turret. The first floor of the building is comprised of three chambers accommodated beneath the transverse vaults and carried on a series of beams, the ends of which were embedded in the side-walls during construction. The end-walls of the chambers appear to have been built subsequent to the construction of the vaults. Access to the E chamber was through a doorway in its N wall which opens off the mural stair ascending from the entrance lobby. Access to the W and central chambers was probably by means of timber stairs from the ground floor chambers beneath; a number of beam sockets which are preserved near the NW corner of the W ground floor chamber may have served to secure such a stair. Both the central and W first floor chambers were lit by narrow loops at N, set in deep, rectangular embrasures. Traces of an embrasure ingoing survives in the S end-wall of the central chamber, and it is probable that a loop in this position also lit the largely destroyed E chamber. The commodious mural stair which ascends from the entrance lobby to the second floor of the building is broken in places. Ceiled by slabs which rest on the oversail formed by a slight inward corbel of its high side-walls, it is lit by three narrow loops set in lintelled, splayed embrasures. It ascends to a doorway, furnished internally with a single drawbar socket, through which access is gained to a small lobby; the ceiling slab immediately outside features a large circular perforation of uncertain purpose. The lobby is accommodated in the E wall of the building at a slightly lower level than the second floor; it is lit by a splayed loop at E, and from it access is gained, through a poorly preserved doorway at N, into a small room which comprises the first floor of the corner turret. This room is spanned by a low vault, and is lit by splayed, lintelled loops at N, E and W. A short stair ascends from the S side of the lobby to the E end of the second floor hall. The second mural stair commences at the doorway set in an ingoing of the large window embrasure in the W ground floor chamber. The doorway could be secured from within by a drawbar, the sockets for which remain. The stair turns to S in the NW angle of the building, and after a short ascent leads to another doorway which could be secured from its S side by means of two drawbars. From here the stair continues to ascend and is stepped to E to maintain its central position in the wall which is reduced in thickness at this level. It leads to a short mural passage at the S end of which a doorway, with only the N jamb surviving, gives access to the W end of the second floor hall. The stair and passage are ceiled by slabs and are lit by three splayed loops. The walls of the building are reduced in thickness from an average of 2.65m above the ba