HOME



picture info

Carrickfergus Castle
Carrickfergus Castle (from the Irish ''Carraig Ḟergus'' or "cairn of Fergus", the name "Fergus" meaning "strong man") is a Norman castle in Northern Ireland, situated in the town of Carrickfergus in County Antrim, on the northern shore of Belfast Lough. Besieged in turn by the Scottish, rebel Irish, English, and French, the castle played an important military role until 1928 and remains one of the best preserved medieval structures in Northern Ireland. It was strategically useful, with 3/4 of the castle perimeter surrounded by water (although in modern times only 1/3 of it is surrounded by water due to land reclamation). Today it is maintained by the Department for Communities as a state care historic monument, at grid ref: J4143 8725. Origins Carrickfergus was built by John de Courcy in 1177 as his headquarters, after he conquered eastern Ulster and ruled as a petty king until 1204, when he was ousted by another Norman adventurer, Hugh de Lacy. Initially de Courcy buil ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Carrickfergus Castle, Reflections At Sunset - Geograph
Carrickfergus ( , meaning "Fergus Mór mac Eirc, Fergus' rock") is a large town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It sits on the north shore of Belfast Lough, from Belfast. The town had a population of 28,141 at the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 census. It is County Antrim's oldest town and one of the oldest towns in Ireland as a whole. Carrickfergus Castle, built in the late 12th century at the behest of Anglo-Normans, Anglo-Norman knight John de Courcy, was the capital of the Earldom of Ulster. After the earldom's collapse, it remained the only English outpost in Ulster for the next four centuries. Carrickfergus was the administrative centre for Carrickfergus Borough Council, before this was amalgamated into the Mid and East Antrim District Council in 2015, and forms part of the Belfast Metropolitan Area. It is also a townland of 65 acres, a Civil parishes in Ireland, civil parish and a Barony (Ireland), barony. History Middle Ages The town is said to take its name fr ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Cannon
A cannon is a large-caliber gun classified as a type of artillery, which usually launches a projectile using explosive chemical propellant. Gunpowder ("black powder") was the primary propellant before the invention of smokeless powder during the late 19th century. Cannons vary in gauge (firearms), gauge, effective range, mobility (military), mobility, rate of fire, elevation (ballistics), angle of fire and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees, depending on their intended use on the battlefield. A cannon is a type of heavy artillery weapon. The word ''cannon'' is derived from several languages, in which the original definition can usually be translated as ''tube'', ''cane'', or ''reed''. The earliest known depiction of cannons may have appeared in Science and technology of the Song dynasty#Gunpowder warfare, Song dynasty China as early as the 12th century; however, solid archaeological and documentary evidence of cannons do ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Artillery
Artillery consists of ranged weapons that launch Ammunition, munitions far beyond the range and power of infantry firearms. Early artillery development focused on the ability to breach defensive walls and fortifications during sieges, and led to heavy, fairly immobile siege engines. As technology improved, lighter, more mobile field artillery cannons were developed for battlefield use. This development continues today; modern self-propelled artillery vehicles are highly mobile weapons of great versatility generally providing the largest share of an army's total firepower. Originally, the word "artillery" referred to any group of soldiers primarily armed with some form of manufactured weapon or armour. Since the introduction of gunpowder and cannon, "artillery" has largely meant cannon, and in contemporary usage, usually refers to Shell (projectile), shell-firing Field gun, guns, howitzers, and Mortar (weapon), mortars (collectively called ''barrel artillery'', ''cannon artil ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Battle Of Carrickfergus (1597)
The Battle of Carrickfergus took place in November 1597, in the province of Ulster in what is now County Antrim, Northern Ireland, during the Nine Years War (Ireland), Nine Years War. It was fought between the crown forces of Queen Elizabeth I of England, Elizabeth I and the Gaelic clan of Clan Donald, MacDonnell, with military support from Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, and resulted in a defeat for the English. Background The north-east of Ulster was much fought over during the 16th century. Carrickfergus itself had been the base for a failed English attempt to colonise that corner of the province in the 1570s, but in the following decades the English influence gave way to the MacDonnells under the leadership of Sorley Boy MacDonnell, Sorley Boy. In 1595 the Irish lords in Ulster rose out in rebellion under Hugh O'Neill, 3rd Earl of Tyrone, Hugh O'Neill, and the crown's only foothold in County Antrim was at Carrickfergus, and a small garrison in Belfast Castle. The MacDonn ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Nine Years War (Ireland)
The Nine Years' War (May 1593 – 30 March 1603) was a conflict in Ireland between a confederacy of Irish lords (with Spanish support) and the English-led government. The war was primarily a response to the ongoing Tudor conquest of Ireland, and was also part of the Anglo-Spanish War and the European wars of religion. Henry VIII of England established the Kingdom of Ireland in 1542 as an English dependency. Various clans accepted English sovereignty under the surrender and regrant policy. Widespread resentment developed amongst the Gaelic nobility against English rule by the early 1590s, due to the execution of Gaelic chieftains, the pillaging of chiefdoms by British sheriffs, and Catholic persecution. The war is generally considered to have begun with Hugh Maguire revolting against the appointment of Humphrey Willis as sheriff of Fermanagh. The war began in Ulster and northern Connacht as Ulster lords Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, and Hugh Roe O'Donnell revolted agains ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

The Crown
The Crown is a political concept used in Commonwealth realms. Depending on the context used, it generally refers to the entirety of the State (polity), state (or in federal realms, the relevant level of government in that state), the executive government specifically or only to the monarch and their Viceroy, direct representatives. The term can be used to refer to the rule of law; or to the functions of executive (government), executive (the Crown-King-in-Council, in-council), legislative (the Crown-in-parliament), and judicial (the Crown on the bench) governance and the civil service. The concept of the Crown as a corporation sole developed first in the Kingdom of England as a separation of the physical crown and property of the kingdom from the person and personal property of the monarch. It spread through English and later British colonisation and developed into an imperial crown, which rooted it in the legal lexicon of all 15 Commonwealth realms, their various dependencies, ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Earldom Of Ulster
The Earldom of Ulster was an Anglo-Norman lordship in north-eastern Ireland during the Middle Ages, ruled by the Earls of Ulster and part of the Lordship of Ireland. The Norman knight John de Courcy invaded the Gaelic Irish kingdom of Ulaid in 1177 and conquered most of its territory over the following few years. In 1181 he was made earl palatine of Ulster by Henry II of England. The earldom was the most important Anglo-Norman lordship in the north of Ireland. It covered most of what are now the Ulster counties of Antrim and Down, and briefly extended west to Lough Foyle. Its capital was Carrickfergus Castle. The Earldom of Ulster suffered heavily from the Bruce campaign in Ireland in the 1310s, from which it never recovered. By the 15th century the earldom was restricted to coastal enclaves in County Down and around Carrickfergus, and the title of Earl of Ulster passed to the Crown in 1461. De Courcy's invasion of Ulaid In 1175, after a period of fighting between the N ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Gatehouse
A gatehouse is a type of fortified gateway, an entry control point building, enclosing or accompanying a gateway for a town, religious house, castle, manor house, or other fortification building of importance. Gatehouses are typically the most heavily armed section of a fortification, to compensate for being structurally the weakest and the most probable attack point by an enemy. There are numerous surviving examples in France, Austria, Germany, England and Japan. History Gatehouses made their first appearance in the early antiquity when it became necessary to protect the main entrance to a castle or town. Famous early examples of such gates are those such as the Ishtar Gate in Babylon. Over time, they evolved into very complicated structures with many lines of defence. The Romans began building fortified walls and structures throughout Europe such as the Aurelian Walls of Rome with gates such as Porta San Paolo and Porta Nigra from the ancient defenses of Trier in Germany. Str ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Portcullis
A portcullis () is a heavy, vertically closing gate typically found in medieval fortifications. It consists of a latticed Grille (architecture), grille made of wood and/or metal, which slides down grooves inset within each jamb of the gateway. Usage Portcullises fortified the entrances to many medieval castles, securely closing them off during times of attack or siege. Every portcullis was mounted in vertical grooves in the walls of the castle and could be raised or lowered quickly by using chains or ropes attached to an internal winch. Portcullises had an advantage over standard gates in that they could be closed immediately at a time of crisis by a single guard. Two portcullises to the main Gate, entrance would often be used. The one closer to the inside would be closed first, and then the one further away. This was used to trap enemies, and burning wood or fire-heated sand would usually be dropped onto them from murder-holes or the roof. Early thermal weapons#Hot oil, Hot oi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Murder Hole
A murder hole or meurtrière is a hole in the ceiling of a gateway or passageway in a fortification through which the defenders could shoot, throw or pour harmful substances or objects such as rocks, arrows, scalding water, hot sand, quicklime, or boiling oil, down on attackers. Boiling oil was rarely used because of its cost. Murder holes and machicolations Similar holes, called machicolations, were often located in the curtain walls of castles, fortified manor houses, and city walls. The parapet would project over corbels so that holes would be located over the exterior face of the wall, allowing the defenders to target attackers at the base of the wall. The primary difference between these two features is in their location. Murder holes were located on the interiors of castles and other fortified buildings at the entranceway. Their supposed intention was to discourage (or kill) invaders once they had breached the walls, though it has been suggested that they may have in so ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Romanesque Sculpture
Romanesque art is the art of Europe from approximately 1000 AD to the rise of the Gothic style in the 12th century, or later depending on region. The preceding period is known as the Pre-Romanesque period. The term was invented by 19th-century art historians, especially for Romanesque architecture, which retained many basic features of Roman architectural style – most notably round-headed arches, but also barrel vaults, apses, and acanthus-leaf decoration – but had also developed many very different characteristics. In Southern France, Spain, and Italy there was an architectural continuity with the Late Antique, but the Romanesque style was the first style to spread across the whole of Catholic Europe, from Sicily to Scandinavia. Romanesque art was also greatly influenced by Byzantine art, especially in painting, and by the anti-classical energy of the decoration of the Insular art of the British Isles. From these elements was forged a highly innovative and coherent sty ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]