Portaferry Castle is a small

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 ...

in Portaferry,

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 531,665. It borders County Antrim to the ...

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

, overlooking the harbour. It was built in the 16th century by William Le Savage. Portaferry Castle tower house is a State Care Historic Monument in 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 Ballyphilip, in Borough of Ards, at grid ref: J5930 5085.

History

The castle was probably built in the 16th century by a member of the Savage family. In 1635, Patrick Savage's brother-in-law, Sir James Montgomery of Rosemount ( Greyabbey), repaired the castle by roofing and flooring it so that his sister could live in greater comfort there.

Features

It is a square building with a small projecting turret on the south corner. It is three storeys high plus attic and there is no vault. Most of the eastern corner is in ruins. The entrance at the base of the tower is protected by a small

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 ...

and the entrance to the ground floor chamber is protected by 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 ...

. A curved stairway within the tower rises to the first floor and a spiral stairway in the west corner continues to roof level.

References

{{Reflist Castles in County Down Ruined castles in Northern Ireland Portaferry Northern Ireland Environment Agency properties Savage family Tower houses in Northern Ireland

History

Features

See also

References