| Our dream |
| We hope someday that our McGrath Clan will join together to purchase one of these sites, and rebuild the McGrath Castle on it, to serve as a McGrath Clan Heritage Centre. We have formed the McGrath Clan trust, and over the coming years we will strive to achieve that goal. It is not inconcievable that we could restore one castle in the South of Ireland and one in the North. Click on the map to see the castles in each area. We will add info and pictures as we find them. Thanks to those who have supplied us with pictures thus far; Roy McGrath from Jo'burg in South Africa, Liam McGrath for much of the text and of course John McGrath. |
| The history of Castles in Ireland |
| A castle is a fortified residence. Our Celtic ancestors made forts of all kinds as early as 1200 BC in Central Europe's hills and valleys. In Ireland, most were circular in form, called ring forts. Some were simple as a farmer chieftain's rath in the form of a wooden stockade of oak or pine posts, surrounded by a ditch or moat, and with a wooden watch tower over the entrance gate. Inside he would have his large circular house-actually 2 circles, a large one for living, eating and sleeping, and a smaller one attached for cooking and kitchen. There could be another smaller house, for the married son or honoured guest. There was room inside the stockade for cattle for safety at night, or in a siege. There were craft shops (wood working, metal working forge). There would be many food storage pits underground, and some storage sheds above ground. There were stone-lined underground tunnels called souterrains for cold storage and escape exits, often running underground to surface in a wood nearby. 30,000 of these ring fort sites have been discovered by aerial mapping in Ireland. They were a local chief's or `strong farmer's castle'. Some think our name McGrath (Magrath) means "son of the rath" or castle. In places where there were suitable large hills, a larger fort would be constructed on a series of ditches and mounds and walls, and even stone walls reinforced with timbers set in them, to resist sieges. These are called duns, and are found everywhere Celts thrived, in Gaul, Germany, Switzerland, Bohemia, Iberia (Spain), Britain, Scotland, Isle of Man, Ireland, Brittany, Cornwall, etc. Some later became fortified villages and ports. A stone fort or cashel could be at the top centre of the dun. Sometimes round stone towers called a broch were built in Scotland. In later years, square towers were built, called a bawn. When the Normans came, they built wooden castles at first, on mounds, surrounded by walls and ditches. These developed later into larger stone castles. |
| Island magrath Castle click for more on this castle |
Their first fences were made of weaving willow, hazel and other hardwood hurdles, and they also used these in building house walls, plastering over the wattles. Linking this with their love of fishing, they wove their own fishing nets. This is an added proof linking the first McGrath Clan on Islandmagrath with ships and fishing. Already in 300 BC a famous poet of ancient Ireland composed a long poem which contains this revealing verse, illustrating the way the Irish bards regarded their word-craft: "Din do rigghruad uaim tengad" In the book, "READING THE IRISH LANDSCAPE" by Mitchel and Ryan, 2001, Mitchell, an expert in reading ancient pollens and Ryan a top archaeologist, tell what they found at Islandmagrath: "One interesting structure found at Islandmagrath on mudflats in the upper Fergus estuary in Co. Clare may also have been connected with communications. There Aidan O' Sullivan has mapped a linear wooden structure about 35 metres long and 2 metres wide running along the foreshore. Made of closely spaced stout ash and alder roundwood posts with wattles interwoven, the interior is laid with horizontal panels of hurdles pegged in place. A piece of withy, perhaps a form of rope, was found. The structure is dated by radiocarbon to between 800 BC and 550 BC. It may have been a trackway or perhaps a jetty. |
| McGrath Castle in Co. Donegal click for more on this castle |
 If Islandmagrath Castle was the oldest one of our castle sites in Co. Clare, the area in which our Clan was first organised, it may be that the McGrath Castle in Co. Donegal, near Pettigo, is the next oldest surviving. In June, 2002, we attended the McGrath/Magrath Clan Reunion at Pettigo and visited the derelict McGrath Castle nearby. It dates back at least to the early 17 th century, and is associated with the Magraths of Fermanagh, Donegal and Tyrone. There are 88,000 McGrath families throughout the world, many in Northern Ireland. In Co. Donegal, the McGrath clan is built upon a long history going back to Medieval times, of being lay termoners invested with the care of church properties. Their family territories were Termon Magrath and Termon-amongan in the counties of Donegal, Tyrone and Fermanagh. Likely they emigrated from Co. Clare during the civil wars which took place among the divided contenders of the O'Brien family, in the 11 to century and following.. While many McGraths moved to Co. Waterford in those days, others apparently went to Co. Donegal. This was this branch of the Clan from which came the infamous Myler McGrath, who lived from 1522 to 1622. Myler's father Donagh Magrath, was the hereditary erenach of Termon Magrath as well as the local clan chieftain. To be an erenach was a hereditary office, and its holder was a married man, a rule harking back to St. Patrick, who accepted lands as gifts from the laity, if they would continue to help support the church work there. This meant, that married men were in control of these Catholic properties, and not clergy. They could profit from dispensing hospitality from the properties, receive small annual payments, and place their children into the clergy. This was an ancient privilege that went back to the times before celibacy was enforced on the clergy. St. Patrick himself left canons or rules to legitimise married priests (both his father and grandfather were married clergy in Britain). The termon Magraths controlled St. Patrick's Purgatory at Lough Derg. Thus McGraths controlled church incomes. You can imagine those who were raised in these kinds of families, regarded the church as partly their own family matter. This may help explain the career of Myler McGrath, who was archbishop first in the Catholic Church, and then in the Anglican Protestant Church. As the son of a chieftain, when he switched from Catholicism to Protestantism, he knew he would be attacked by his former allies, so he recruited and armed a private army of ~ 100 guards from his own McGrath relatives in Co. Donegal. Myler never felt shy about using church funds for his own benefit. He married twice and had many children, among whom he distributed much land and profits. He seldom attended to his church duties, but on the other hand, it could be said of him in a fanatic age, he never persecuted anyone for their religion! No doubt many of the Protestant McGraths of Ireland were descendants of Myler McGrath. He certainly felt that there was more money to be made in the South than in the North! Neglecting church duties to help his own family, many were jealous of him. He gave the rites of the church to Protestants and Catholics. He was buried in Lismore cathedral crypt. |
| The 12 McGrath Castles of Co. Waterford |
This data is based on 3 sources: Patrick C. Power's HISTORY OF WATERFORD CITY, 1998, 354 pp., Frank O'Brien's THE O'BRIENS OF DEISE, 2001, 230 PP., and Michael Walsh's SILKEN PHILIP MCGRATH AND HIS SLEADY CASTLE LADY, 6 pp. newspaper article, December 10, 1993, Munster Express. Abbeyside McGrath Castle : Built by Donal McGrath, before 1210 AD, founder of the nearby Augustinian Abbey. This man was a merchant shipper, who may also have built the Abbeyside McGrath Tower, as a ship spotting watch tower along the bay. The Abbeyside McGrath Castle survived until 1916, and was dismantled because the ruins had become dangerous. Ballynaquilkee McGrath Castle, Casticlonagh, Castleconnagh, Castlereigh (Castlereagh, near Pigeon Hill), Fernane Castle (near Mountain Castle but demolished), Castlecoscoran Castle (property of John McGrath, brother of Silken Philip McGrath and Pierce McGrath), Kilmanehan McGrath Castle (originally seized in 1565 by Rory McGrath) where Pierce McGrath lived in 1628. This castle still survives alongside the River Suir and is at present abandoned, after an attempt by the recent owner to restore it, negated by the Duchas board because it was of mixed periods, and the attempt was being made to modernize it. A famous brand of Irish whiskey is named after this castle, and it is pictured on the bottle. Mountain Castle, the small central tower of which still survives on Mountain Castle Farm, near Sleady Castle which was built in 1628 by Silken Philip McGrath for his bride Mary de Paor, and later seized by the British because 3 Clonmel garrison officers were kidnapped from it and killed by the infamous bandit Mr. Green. Slight ruins remain yet in Waterford City of Waterford Magrath's Castle. These twelve McGrath Castles were located (except for the last-mentioned) in a section of lands stretching from Clonmel south to Dungarvan, occupied by the McGrath Clans as retainers of the exiled O'Brien's from Co. Clare, from the late 1040's to the present time. Most of these castles were seized and/or destroyed during the time of Cromwell's invasion of Ireland, when he offered £5 pounds sterling for each papist castle destroyed or occupied by any of his adventurers. Wily as they were, the McGraths often reoccupied the land confiscated, by marrying or burying the interlope . A good MGr th ,guide can take you to visit many of these castle sites. |
| © Liam McGrath 2003 |
