Merlinpark Castle

On a short rise in the former demesne of Merlin Park House. This Nat. Mon., known as 'Doughiske Castle' until the mid-18th C, was in existence in 1574 when it was in the possession of Stephan Lynch (Nolan 1901, 113). It consists of a well-preserved four-storey rectangular tower (L 8.95m, Wth 7.85m) over a basement. A doorway, centrally placed in E wall, gives access, via a lobby, to ground floor, to spiral stairs in SE corner and to basement stairs in NE. There are subsidiary chambers and latrines to S of the main rooms on ground and 1st floors and an intramural passage in same position on 2nd floor. Stone vaults exist between basement/ground floor and 2nd/3rd floors. Fireplaces occur in N wall of the basement, 2nd, and 3rd floors. Two small chambers (one concealed) occupy the thickness of the vault between the 2nd/3rd floors. The gabled roof contained a garret and had wall-walks with machicolations at parapet level on N, S and W walls. Apart from the horizontal gun slits on ground floor, all the windows are either single or double lights with ogival heads. A sheela-na-gig (GA094-023001-) figure is carved onto the spandrel of a singe-light ogee-headed window on 2nd floor of S wall. A later extension adjoined at E, where traces of a high pitched roofline, a doorway inserted off the spiral stairs and a raised platform indicate a former two-storeyed building, possibly of 17th-C date. (Lynch Athy 1914, 146-52; O'Flanagan 1927a, Vol. 1, 330)