Derryhivenny Castle,
County Galway
The building of true castles came more or less to an end in Ireland with the outbreak of war in 1641 - one of the very last being the tower house and bawn at Derryhivenny. Its date is known from an inscription on one of its bartizan corbels which reads "D:O'M ME:FIERI:FECIT 1643" and states that Donal O'Madden built the castle in 1643.
A late date is supported by the absence of vaults on all four storeys of the tower and by its picturesque diagonally disposed Jacobean chimney-stacks. The upper rooms have two- and three-mullioned windows with good fireplaces, including one fine example with a plain chamfered lintel, curved downwards at each end and covered by a chamfered cornice. Along one side of the enclosure opposite the tower there are fragments of a one-storey gabled building, possibly a stable block. 6 km (3.5 miles) N/NE of Portumna, off a minor road lying E of the Eyrecourt Road. NGR: M 872085.
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