Butlerstown Castle — Butlerstown South

Situated at the E end of a SW-NE spur of rock outcrop. References to the Butlers here date from the mid-13th century and by the mid-15th century the land had passed by marriage to the Nugent family (Anon. 1907, 181-3). In the 17th century the castle was owned by the Sherlock family and it was damaged by a fire in 1798 (Decie 1978, 14). The Sherlocks sold the castle in the early 19th century to a Mr Backas who built the house attached to the SW wall of the tower house and modernised the latter. This is a rectangular tower (ext. dims. 12.2m NE-SW; 10.2m NW-SE) of three storeys with a base-batter on the NE wall. The original entrance, towards the W end of the SW wall, was altered in the 19th century to connect with the adjoining house. The newel stairs which connected the upper floors at the W angle was probably removed at this time as it no longer descends to the ground floor. There is a large ante-chamber in the SW wall off the entrance passage, and the ground floor embrasures in the NE, SE and NW walls have been altered, that on the SE has been converted into a fireplace and oven. The loft, under a NE-SW barrel-vault, is entered by a round-headed doorway at the NW from a mural passage in the NE and NW walls, and there is a large barrel-vaulted antechamber in the SW wall. A spiral stairs at the W angle leads to the first floor with modernised window embrasures in the NW, NE and SE walls, a double garderobe in the SW wall and an original fireplace in the SE wall. The stairs continue to the second floor which has modernised window embrasures in the NW, NE and SE walls, and the garderobe in the SW wall is now destroyed. The stairs continued to upper levels but they are now blocked by the squinches of the ornamental turrets and modern parapet which were added in the 19th century. A number of linear cropmarks running NW-SW and NE-SW in the field immediately NW of the tower house have been identified in aerial photographs of the tower house and immediate environs (pers. comm. S. Dowling, SMR file). The precise function of these features is unknown, they may be associated with drainage or may relate to an earlier field system. (Anon. 1907; Decie 1978; Moore 1999, no. 1595) Compiled by: Michael Moore, Paul Walsh Date of revision: 08 October 2013