Castle Hackett is a 13th-century
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 ...
at the base of
Knockma hill, south-west 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 ...
,
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 ...
.
History
The tower house was built by the
Hacketts, a
Norman
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norm ...
family. The Kirwans, one of the
tribes of Galway
The Tribes of Galway ( ga, Treibheanna na Gaillimhe) were 14 merchant families who dominated the political, commercial and social life of the city of Galway in western Ireland between the mid-13th and late 19th centuries. They were the families ...
, settled there in the 15th century. The Castlehacket branch of the family was established in the mid-17th century by
Sir John Kirwan
Sir John Kirwan (1650–1721) was an Irish merchant and politician who founded the Kirwans of Castle Hackett, County Galway.
Background
Kirwan was a member of one of the Tribes of Galway. The family were of Gaelic origin, possibly of Conmhaà ...
. The castle was abandoned in the 18th century and the Kirwans built a new three-story house called Castlehacket which was
burned in 1923 during the
Civil War
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
but rebuilt and still stands today.
In the introduction to his ''Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry'' (1888),
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats (13 June 186528 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and became a pillar of the Irish liter ...
mentions the family and Castlehacket, writing, "Each county has usually some family, or personage, supposed to have been favoured or plagued
ith fairy-seeing abilities especially by the phantoms, as the Hackets of Castle Hacket, Galway, who had for their ancestor a fairy…"
See also
*
Tower houses in Britain and Ireland
Tower houses ( ga, caisleán) appeared on the Islands of Ireland and Great Britain starting from the High Middle Ages. They were constructed in the wilder parts of Great Britain and Ireland, particularly in Scotland, and throughout Ireland, until ...
*
Norman Ireland
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norm ...
Castlehackett National School
References
Bibliography
*
O'Flaherty, Roderic (1846). .
*Spellissy, Sean (1999). ''The History of Galway''.
*Salter, Mike (2004) "The Castles of Connacht")
*Lynch, Ronan (2006). ''The Kirwans of Castlehackett''.
Castles in County Galway
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