Dunmore Castle, Castlefarm

Dunmore Castle, Castlefarm in County Galway was erected by the Anglo-Norman de Bermingham family. Local tradition holds that the place-name derives from the Irish for “great hillfort” and that the site served as a subsidiary residence of the ancient Kings of Connacht, preserving a symbolic association with an earlier defensive location on the hill.

The first known fortification here was established in the early thirteenth century by the de Berminghams as a defensive stronghold against neighbouring Gaelic Irish groups. The castle saw repeated military action in the medieval period: it was attacked and set on fire by the Ó Conchubhair in 1249, besieged in 1284 by the Síol Maelruain under Fiachra O’Flynn, and damaged in 1315 when Rory O’Conor struck the place during the Bruce campaign in Ireland.

Most of the surviving fabric of the castle dates to the early fourteenth century, when the site functioned as a two-storey hall keep. In the sixteenth century the building was altered to add extra floors and domestic features, including roof gables, chimneys, new windows and a ground-level entrance to improve comfort and access.

During the Tudor period the de Bermingham family rebelled against Queen Elizabeth I. In 1569 Sir Henry Sidney, the Lord Deputy of Ireland, took the castle from the family, though it was later returned. In the mid-seventeenth century the fortress was seized permanently during the Cromwellian settlements and passed to the Ouseley family, whose descendants, including Gideon Ouseley, occupied the property into the nineteenth century. A lime kiln was added on the site in the nineteenth century, marking further reuse.