Gallarus Castle

Gallarus Castle
Contae Chiarraí Near Dingle/An Daingean in Ireland
Gallarus Castle
Site information
Type	Tower house
Owner	Knight of Kerry
Condition	restored
Location
Coordinates	52°10′33″N 10°21′21″W / 52.1758°N 10.3558°W / 52.1758; -10.3558
Height	4 storeys
Site history
Built	15th century

Gallarus Castle is a four-storey rectangular tower house in Baile na nGall, County Kerry, Ireland and is notable as one of the few fortified structures preserved on the Dingle Peninsula.

History

Gallarus Castle was built in the 15th century by the Knight of Kerry, the holder of a hereditary knighthood belonging to the Geraldine Dynasty. It is now an Irish heritage site.

The building has been extensively restored and a new rectangular doorway inserted in the north wall. There is no evidence of a stone stairway below the second floor. A mural stairway rises in the east wall and the ceilings on the third and fourth floor are vaulted.

Gallarus Castle stands about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) away from the better known and more historically significant Gallarus Oratory.^[1]

References

1. Anonymous 1846, p. 228: "Gallerus or Gollerus, a village, and a cluster of curious antiquities, near the head of Smerwick Harbour, parish of Kilmelehedor, barony of Corkaguiney, County Kerry, Munster. The antiquities are a curious hermitage, a tower  .. and a castle which belonged to the Fitzgeralds, Knights of Kerry ..."

Sources

• Anonymous (1846). The Parliamentary Gazetteer of Ireland. Vol. 2. Dublin: A. Fullarton. – D to M (for Gallerus)