Templehouse Castle

Templehouse Castle stands on the northern shore of Templehouse Lake in County Sligo, a substantial medieval hall-house first recorded in 1271 when Hugh O'Connor broke it down. Its uncoursed limestone walls still rise two storeys high, though the western side has largely vanished and the ground-floor vaulting has crumbled to fragments. A narrow mural staircase still winds upward beside the northern window, inviting imagination about the people who climbed it through centuries of turmoil, renovation and quiet decline.