Portlick Castle

Multi-period castle originally built by the Dillon family and extended over the centuries. Castle stands 125m S of Portlick Bay on the E shoreline of Lough Ree. A place-name marked 'Togher' is depicted 100m N of the castle on the 1838 ed. OS 6-inch map, with Rabbit Warren depicted 60m to NNE. On this map an area called 'Church Park' is depicted 270m to the S. This park contains the remains of a graveyard (WM022-014----), a possible church site (WM022-014002-), possible early Christian ecclesiastical enclosure (WM022-014002-), an early Christian cross-slab (WM022-014003-) and a motte and bailey castle (WM022--015---). An early Christian cross-slab (WM022-003----) now lost but recorded in 1976 as built into S wall of orchard 180m S of Portlick Castle may have originally come from the graveyard in the 'Church Park'.

According to Walsh (1915, 86) 'The barony of Kilkenny West was granted to the Dillon family in the twelfth century. The modern family is descended from Henry de Lion who arrived in Ireland in 1185 at the behest of King John. He built his house and chapel at Drumraney and in the centuries that followed the Dillions founded a number of castles and tower houses in the barony of Kilkenny West. Most of them are no longer extant except for Portlick Castle'. In 1608 King James I confirmed ownership of 'the manor, castle, and lands of Portlicke, with 2 cart.[rons] in Enoyne, Aghnemony, and Lisloghnan, with the fishing belonging and adjoining to the castle of Portlicke' to Sir Theobald Dillon of Kilfaughny (Cal. pat. rolls Ire., Jas I, 124-5).

The medieval castle of Portlick is shown on the 1654-7 Down Survey map of Kilkenny West barony where it is depicted as a tower house type fortification with one and a half storey high house attached to E side of tower (NLI, MS 723-4). Tall chimney stacks are shown rising above the roof line of the house. The castle is depicted in a similar fashion on the Down Survey map of Bunowen parish where the estate lands are shown as consisting of 190 acres of land in Portlick and a cartron of land amounting to 125 acres in Whinning. The terrier of the Down Survey map of Bunowen parish stated that ‘on Portlicke Standes a Castle’ and that Garratt Dillon, an Irish papist was the owner of the castle and lands of Portlicke. Garratt Dillon was also listed as the owner of 204 acres of lands in the adjoining townland of Liskilling [Lissakillen North & South] and 98 acres of ‘Red Bog’ also in Liskilling (ibid.).

Portlick Castle was the residence of the Dillon family until 1696 when its resident Garret Dillon was declared attainted and his property was confiscated by the Williamite government. The confiscated estate measuring 356 acres was granted to Thomas Keightly, a member of the Privy Council of Ireland who sold the lands of Portlick, Whinnings, Cartron and ⅓ of the Great Island to William Palmer of Dublin. In 1703 Reverend Robert Smyth of Dublin purchased the lands of Portlick Castle amounting to 190 acres (Sheehan 1978, 68). The estate was sold by the Smyth family in 1954 (ibid.).

Portlick Castle was described by Bence-Jones (1978, 233) as following; ‘An old keep with a battlemented later wing. In the nineteenth century, the seat of Robert Ralph Smyth and then of his nephew, Robert Wolfe Smyth’. The castle was described by Casey and Rowan (1993, 303) as following; ‘The back of the Portlick Castle shows the Dillon tower house as a severe rectangular block adjoined by a plain Georgian range, two storeys by seven bays. The tower, probably fifteenth century, is of impressive bulk. Four storeys high, it incorporates within a regular plan four projected corner towers. These appear on the exterior only as the thinnest of loops with small first and second floor mullion windows in the central block, giving a harsh defensive character to the castle. The Georgian wing added by the Smyths is gabled and rough-cast, with sash windows on both floors and a centrally placed staircase. About 1860 further changes were made to the castle by Robert Ralph Smyth, who added a large castellated block across the front of the Georgian wing. Portlick's entrance front now reads as two towers joined by a low two bay Georgian link. The new "tower" is a two storey rubble block with stepped battlements and large mullioned windows divided into the traditional late Georgian proportions of a Wyatt window. The original tower has a machicolation chute projecting above the original entrance and many small mullioned windows which appear to have been added during the Victorian rebuild’.

The castle was described by the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage [NIAH] as following: ‘Three-bay four-storey late medieval tower house, built c.1500, with later seven-bay two-storey extension added to the southwest, c.1800, and a two-bay two-storey castellated block added to the southwest corner of this extension, c.1865. Extension, c.1990, to the northeast end. Now in use as an hotel. Pitched natural slate roofs hidden behind raised parapets with Irish-style battlements. Machicolation chute to northwest face of tower house at third and fourth floor level, above original entrance. Rendered chimneystacks with terracotta chimneypots. Tower house constructed of rubble limestone and rendered finish to later Georgian wing, c.1800. Later castellated extension constructed using snecked limestone with cut limestone trim, including projecting string courses with corbels. Square-headed openings with cut stone mullions and loop hole openings to tower house, square-headed openings to later Georgian wing with replacement windows. Square-headed window openings with dressed stone surrounds, cut stone mullions and hoodmouldings to castellated wing having replacement timber casement windows. Round-headed doorcase with timber sheeted door to northwest face of tower house, square-headed doorcase with cut stone surround to north face of c.1865 extension with modern timber door. An imposing and impressive late-medieval tower house with a number of later nineteenth century castellated extensions, which retain their early form, character and a great deal of the original fabric. It represents an excellent example of the continued use of a large-scale structure from the medieval period, illustrating changing architectural tastes and styles over a four hundred year period. The c. 1865 extension was added following a fire in 1861, which destroyed much of the interior of the existing castle. The tower house was originally constructed c.1500 by the Dillion Family who lived here until 1696, when it was taken over by the Crown and granted to Thomas Keightly, a member of King William's privy council in Ireland. It was sold, c.1700, to William Palmer of Dublin, who promptly sold it on to the Smyth Family, of Barbavilla House (15400813) near Collinstown, who remained in ownership of Portlick Castle into the twentieth century’ (http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=record&county=WM&regno=15402212)