Rathdrum Castle, Rathdrum, Co. Tipperary South

Co. Tipperary |

Tower Houses

Rathdrum Castle, Rathdrum, Co. Tipperary South

On a gentle rise in the rolling pastureland of South Tipperary stands what remains of Rathdrum Castle, a medieval tower house that once belonged to the Mocler family.

Historical records from the Civil Survey of 1654-56 tell us that Redmond Mocler, described as an 'Irish Papist', owned these lands in 1640, when the castle was already noted as being just 'a stump' with its walls still standing. Today, the limestone rubble structure continues its slow surrender to time, with ivy creeping over its eastern corner and much of its upper floors lost to centuries of neglect.

The tower house, measuring roughly 11 metres by 8 metres, was built with thick walls nearly two metres wide and featured the characteristic base batter common to such fortifications. Visitors approaching from the southwest would have entered through a doorway, now missing, that led to an entrance lobby complete with a spiral staircase in the western corner and a small guardroom to the south. The ground floor chamber, a modest space of about 4.5 metres square, received light through two round-headed windows; one centered in the southeast wall, the other at the northern end of the northeast wall, though the latter has since been broken out.

Above, the first floor once rested on wooden beams supported by stone corbels, with a barrel vault overhead that ran northeast to southwest. Though much of this vault has collapsed, the vertical recesses that once held the formwork supports remain visible in the walls, silent testimony to medieval building techniques. The upper levels included practical amenities like wall cupboards and a garderobe chute in the southeast wall, which would have served a toilet on the second floor, its outlet still visible about 1.35 metres above ground level. While only fragments of the castle survive, these ruins offer a tangible connection to the Moclers and their place in the complex tapestry of 17th-century Irish landownership.

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