Site of Castle Loaghny, Longstone, Co. Tipperary South

Co. Tipperary |

Masonry Castles

Site of Castle Loaghny, Longstone, Co. Tipperary South

On the southwest-facing slope of rising ground in County Tipperary South, the former site of Castle Loaghny offers little to the casual observer beyond scattered stones in a grassy field.

This upland area overlooks low, marshy wetlands to the south and west, with higher ground rising to the north. The castle's location was strategic, positioned 270 metres north of a ringfort and 430 metres northeast of an old church and graveyard, though today nothing remains visible at ground level except what might be remnants of its defensive walls; a long linear feature, possibly an old field bank, runs north before turning east and appears to enclose the area where the castle once stood.

The Ordnance Survey letters from the 1830s preserve what little was known of the castle even then, recording that locals called it 'Caislean Lachtnainn' or Castleloughnan. By that time, it had already been reduced to merely 'a heap of small stones and mortar', with all the larger stones having been carried away by enterprising neighbours for building their own houses. This practical recycling of building materials was common throughout Ireland, where abandoned strongholds often served as convenient quarries for local construction projects.

What may be most intriguing about the site today is the possible surviving bawn wall, those defensive walls that once enclosed the castle grounds. The linear earthwork that can still be traced in the landscape might represent the footings of these protective walls, running from the field boundary south of where the castle stood. Though the castle itself has vanished, these subtle marks in the landscape hint at the defensive perimeter that once protected Castle Loaghny and its inhabitants during more turbulent times in Irish history.

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