Feartagar Castle, also called Jennings Castle, is a

tower house A tower house is a particular type of stone structure, built for defensive purposes as well as habitation. Tower houses began to appear in the Middle Ages, especially in mountainous or limited access areas, in order to command and defend strateg ...

and

National Monument A national monument is a monument constructed in order to commemorate something of importance to national heritage, such as a country's founding, independence, war, or the life and death of a historical figure. The term may also refer to a spec ...

located in

County Galway "Righteousness and Justice" , anthem = () , image_map = Island of Ireland location map Galway.svg , map_caption = Location in Ireland , area_footnotes = , area_total_km2 = ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

Location

Feartagar Castle lies on a hill east of

Kilconly Kilconly is a small rural village near Tuam which is north of Galway City in County Galway, Ireland. It is situated about 12km north west of Tuam town on the Ballinrobe road ( R332). Facts * Feartagar Castle is located 2.3 km (1.4 mi) to the ea ...

and northwest of

Tuam Tuam ( ; ga, Tuaim , meaning 'mound' or 'burial-place') is a town in Ireland and the second-largest settlement in County Galway. It is west of the midlands of Ireland, about north of Galway city. Humans have lived in the area since the Bron ...

, near to the River Nanny.

History

The tower house was built in the 15th–17th century by the de Burgos (Burkes, de Búrca). Descendants of

William de Burgh William de Burgh (; ; ; la, de Burgo; c.1160–winter 1205/06) was the founder of the House of Burgh (later surnamed Burke or Bourke) in Ireland and elder brother of Hubert de Burgh, 1st Earl of Kent and Geoffrey de Burgh, Bishop of Ely. I ...

(c. 1160 – 1205/06), Anglo-Norman knight and close friend of King John, the Burkes ruled in

Connacht Connacht ( ; ga, Connachta or ), is one of the provinces of Ireland, in the west of Ireland. Until the ninth century it consisted of several independent major Gaelic kingdoms (Uí Fiachrach, Uí Briúin, Uí Maine, Conmhaícne, and Delbhn ...

for centuries. They were dispossessed in 1651 by the

Cromwellian conquest of Ireland The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland or Cromwellian war in Ireland (1649–1653) was the re-conquest of Ireland by the forces of the English Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell, during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Cromwell invaded Ireland wi ...

. The castle later came into the possession of the Blakes of

Description

Castles of Connacht Feartagar, Galway (detail)

Feartagar Castle, County Galway - bartizans

A five-storey tower house, 12 × 10 m at base (39 × 33 ft). Features include round

bartizan A bartizan (an alteration of ''bratticing''), also called a guerite, ''garita'', or ''échauguette'', or spelled bartisan, is an overhanging, wall-mounted turret projecting from the walls of late medieval and early-modern fortifications from the ...

s on each corner, a

machicolation A machicolation (french: mâchicoulis) is a floor opening between the supporting corbels of a battlement, through which stones or other material, such as boiling water, hot sand, quicklime or boiling cooking oil, could be dropped on attackers at t ...

above the doorway and a latrine chute. The second floor is

vaulted In architecture, a vault (French ''voûte'', from Italian ''volta'') is a self-supporting arched form, usually of stone or brick, serving to cover a space with a ceiling or roof. As in building an arch, a temporary support is needed while ring ...

and there are two stone staircases.

References

{{Reflist National Monuments in County Galway Castles in County Galway