Castles of Connacht- Garbally, Galway (geograph 1953904)

Garbally castle is a late medieval

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 ...

located in the parish of

Skehana Skehana or Skehanagh () is a small village and townland in County Galway, Ireland. The name Skehana derives from the Irish ''Sceith eánach'' meaning "place of the whitethorn". Together with nearby Menlough, Skehana is a half-parish within the ...

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 = ...

Location

Garbally Castle is the dominant feature of the

townland A townland ( ga, baile fearainn; Ulster-Scots: ''toonlann'') is a small geographical division of land, historically and currently used in Ireland and in the Western Isles in Scotland, typically covering . The townland system is of Gaelic origi ...

of Garbally in the parish of Skehana and sits at the junction of the R338 and the access road to St Kerrils Abbey. The Garbally townland is small, covering just over and is only ever know to have been occupied by two households. The name is

anglicised Anglicisation is the process by which a place or person becomes influenced by English culture or British culture, or a process of cultural and/or linguistic change in which something non-English becomes English. It can also refer to the influen ...

from the

Irish Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

''Garbh Bhaile'' which means "rough enclosure" or "rough townland".

History

Garbally Castle was built in 1499 by Malachy O'Kelly as a tower house, the Kelly clan being renowned in Ireland at this time as builders of fortresses. The castle was destroyed by MacWilliam De Burgo in 1504, he also destroyed two other O'Kelly fortresses at this time at

Monivea Monivea () is a village in County Galway, Ireland. It is located approximately 30 km from Galway City and 9 km from Athenry. It was formerly part of the kingdom of the Soghain of Connacht. Monivea is known for its forest, Monivea Cas ...

and Gallagh. However, the extent of the destruction inflicted is uncertain as in 1832 Samuel Lewis noted that Garbally castle was "partially destroyed by

Cromwell Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English politician and military officer who is widely regarded as one of the most important statesmen in English history. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1651 Wars of the Three Ki ...

" along with the nearby castle in the 17th century. After this time the lands were owned by three

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

landowners, two of the named Patrick Ffrench, but by the Griffiths Valuation of Tenements in the early 1850s, Robert French, a diplomat who served as Secretary to the British Embassy in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

and

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

was the owner of the entire townland. Garbally was at this time leased to the Blake family and occupied by one Thomas Blake who was the son of the M.P., Patrick Blake. Patrick Blake was a participant in the trial of

Neddy Lohan Neddy Lohan (died in 1820) was Captain of Irish Whiteboys. Lohan was a captain of a group of Whiteboys in the Moylough area of County Galway, responsible for rural unrest and violence. They were opposed by Charles O'Rourke (Moylough), a landlor ...

The ruins

Garbally Castle is a ruin which has its interiors exposed. The castle is constructed as a three-storey tower around square floorplan. The most damaged side is on the southwest and here the thick side walls can be seen, with their mural passages, and there is a vaulted ceiling on the first floor. There is a pointed arch doorway on the southeastern wall which is overlooked by a

gun loop An embrasure (or crenel or crenelle; sometimes called gunhole in the domain of gunpowder-era architecture) is the opening in a battlement between two raised solid portions (merlons). Alternatively, an embrasure can be a space hollowed out ...

in the south

jamb A jamb (from French ''jambe'', "leg"), in architecture, is the side-post or lining of a doorway or other aperture. The jambs of a window outside the frame are called “reveals.” Small shafts to doors and windows with caps and bases are know ...

and there is also a

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 ...

. The parapets of the northeast and southeast walls retain the

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal jutting from a wall to carry a superincumbent weight, a type of bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in the wall, whereas a console is a piece applied to the s ...

s which supported the

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 ...

s. There are some windows in the north eastern wall, with three of them being simple slits. This is the side where a handball court has been created, several Irish monuments have been damaged by handball courts being constructed. Within the handball court there is a plaque which is a memorial to Ellen Mannion who died here in 1850, aged 25, with her husband Michael McDermott and their two children who sheltered in the ruined castle following from their eviction from their house.

References

{{coord, 53.4065, -8.6362, type:landmark_region:IE, display=title Castles in County Galway Ruins in the Republic of Ireland