benburb castle

Within the grounds of the Servite Monastery in Benburb are the remains of one of the more dramatically sited of all inland monuments in Northern Ireland. Its cliff-site controlling the crossing of the River Blackwater had been fortified by Shane O'Neill during the course of the 16th century, but what remains on the site is a castle built after the defeat of Gaelic opposition, when the new planters were staking their claim to the lands which James I had granted to them. By building this castle on a cliff around 1611, Sir Richard Wingfield fulfilled the requirements of the Plantation charter, but he never lived there and leased the property shortly afterwards to one Nicholas White.

The bawn which Wingfield built was almost triangular in ground-plan; the cliff-face provided a natural fortification on the long side of the triangle, and only the other two sides needed walls to keep the enemy out. In addition each end of the existing north wall has a three-storey flanker tower, which could have provided accommodation for a garrison whenever necessary, as no house ever appears to have been built within the walls until one was constructed in the south-western corner in the 18th century - by which time the castle's defences had been rendered harmless after it had been sacked in 1641.