How many castles were built in Ireland?

ireland.man

Has there ever been a serious attempt to survey surviving remains and then estimate the number of castles that were ever built in Ireland? I guess we would define a castle as any fortification using a motte and bailey after 1169, tower houses, etc. I've seen ludicrously differing guesses, anything from a 1000 up to 30,000!

And what about the numbers in Ireland compared to the rest of western Europe, would we have had many more fortifications due to our longer period of instability than most other countries?

Fratton Fred

It's a difficult one to quantify I would guess.

Many early "castles" such as the three remaing ones in Dalkey were actually just houses, but built to be keep out ruffians.

Then, later on, building a house to look like a castle became very fashionable, but these had no need to be defended and the fortifications were purely cosmetic.

pedroeibar1

Fratton Fred wrote: »

It's a difficult one to quantify I would guess.

Many early "castles" such as the three remaing ones in Dalkey were actually just houses, but built to be keep out ruffians.

Then, later on, building a house to look like a castle became very fashionable, but these had no need to be defended and the fortifications were purely cosmetic.

I always understood that Dalkey's seven 'castles' were defensive storehouses for the goods being landed at the harbours and not houses/residential.
What is now the Heritage Centre was converted from such a store to become the Town Hall back in the 1870's.

Fratton Fred

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

I always understood that Dalkey's seven 'castles' were defensive storehouses for the goods being landed at the harbours and not houses/residential.
What is now the Heritage Centre was converted from such a store to become the Town Hall back in the 1870's.

I thought it was a combination of boarding house and store house. But what I meant was that they weren't castles equipped with soldiers etc.

dubhthach

30,000 sounds like the figure for Ringforts, of course some would argue that the first castles was actually built prior to 1169 for example during the reign of Tairrdelbach Ua Conchobair

Cork boy 55

Go to National monument service website
http://www.archaeology.ie/
Click on Archaeological Survey Database
Query data

Results for 26 Counties only.
Castle - Anglo Norman Masonry 129
Castle - Hall House 47
Castle - Moate 253
Castle - Moate and bailey 170
Castle - ringwork 108
Castle - Ringwork and bailey 11
Castle - Town house 999+ *
Castle - unclassified 999+ *
Total At least 2716

* Got error "results too large to display limit query or download data"
unable to download at moment maybe someone else could do it

RDM_83 again

According to D Sweetman there was probably over 3000 Tower-Houses and Terry Barry thought that Ireland in the 17th century was probably the most heavily casilated area in the British Isles.

dubhthach wrote: »

30,000 sounds like the figure for Ringforts, of course some would argue that the first castles was actually built prior to 1169 for example during the reign of Tairrdelbach Ua Conchobair

Yeah that seems right, I think its more like 40,000 but I can't remember if thats the number in the RMP or not, I would doubt that you could really call most Ringforts castles though most don't seem to be have been that well fortified.
If they had wooden Palisades we would be seeing evidence in terms of lots post-holes on the mounds on excavated sites.
The replica of the Ring-Fort at the Waterford heritage park to my mind looks more like a Roman Campaign fort than what probably actually existed.
That said if there was an extensive woven hedge at the top of the mound its defensive properties would have been increased and I am not sure if you would see any archaeological evidence.