Castle - motte, Commons, Co. Meath

Co. Meath |

Mottes & Baileys

Castle – motte, Commons, Co. Meath

The manor of Duleek has a fascinating medieval history that begins with Hugh de Lacy, one of the most powerful Norman lords in Ireland.

After de Lacy established the manor, it changed hands several times amongst the Anglo-Norman nobility; passing to the de Verdun family after 1244, then to Bartholomew de Burghersh in 1332, and finally to the Flemings of Slane in 1372. These were all significant landowning families who shaped the political and social landscape of medieval County Meath.

What remains today of this once-important medieval site is rather modest. The location, known locally as 'the moat', once featured a low mound approximately 35 metres in diameter. This would have been the motte, a type of earthwork castle consisting of a raised mound topped with a wooden or stone keep, typical of early Norman fortifications in Ireland. When the antiquarian Cooper visited in 1783, he documented and illustrated the motte, though by then it was already being quarried for its stone and earth.

Archaeological excavations carried out by K. Campbell in 1981 revealed the extent of the damage done to the site. The dig, catalogued as excavation E000209, found no evidence of the original motte structure, confirming that eighteenth-century quarrying had effectively destroyed this piece of Norman heritage. Despite its current state, the site remains an important reminder of Duleek's strategic significance in medieval Ireland, when control of such manors meant control of the surrounding countryside and its resources.

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