[Illustration: THE CASTLE OF RINN-DUIN, OR RANDOWN, COUNTY OF ROSCOMMON.]
The mighty Shannon--the monarch of island rivers--in all its mazy
wanderings almost from one extremity of Ireland to the other, presents
upon its green and diversified banks but few features of greater natural
beauty or historic interest than the point called Rinn-duin--a peninsula
which stretches into that great expansion of its waters called Lough
Ree, between the counties of Roscommon, Westmeath, and Longford. This
peninsula, which is situated upon the Roscommon shore of the lake, about
eight miles to the north of Athlone, is nearly a mile in length, and, at
its widest part, a quarter of a mile in breadth; but it narrows gradually
towards its extremity, and the lake nearly insulates a moiety of it at
its centre. Its direction being southerly, the eastern side faces the
expanse of the lake, and commands an extensive prospect of its islands
and the opposite shores, while its western side, facing the land, forms a
beautiful bay, fringed with green sloping declivities.
A spot so circumstanced must have struck the early inhabitants of the
country as a sort of natural fortress, which could be easily strengthened
by art; and that it was so strengthened and used as a fortress in the
remotest historic times, may be inferred from its most ancient Celtic
name--Rinn-duin, the point of the Dun or Fort, by which it is still
known in the Irish language, though commonly anglicised Randown, and
more generally called St John’s. It is mentioned by this name in the
following record in the Annals of the Four Masters at the year 1156:--
“There occurred a great fall of snow and a frost in the winter of this
year, so that the lakes and rivers of Ireland were frozen over. The frost
was so great that Roderick O’Conor was enabled to have his ships and
boats carried on the ice from _Blein Gaille_ on the Shannon (at Lough
Ree) to RINN-DUIN.”
Of the earlier history of this fort, however, which was doubtless but
an earthen one, no accounts are preserved, though it may be safely
conjectured that it was seized on and used as a stronghold by the Danish
King Turgesius in the ninth century, as it appears certain from our
annals that he had a strong fastness and harbour for his ships upon
Lough Ree. But, be this as it may, we learn from another record in the
Annals above quoted, that Rinn-duin was used as a fastness by the first
Anglo-Norman invaders of Ireland as early as the close of the twelfth
century, when they were forced to seek safety in it after a defeat which
they had sustained in a battle with Cathal Carrach O’Conor, the son of
Roderick and King of Connaught. The passage is as follows:--
“A. D. 1199. John de Courcy, at the head of the English of the North, and
the son of Hugh de Lacy, at the head of the English of Meath, marched
to Kilmacduach to aid Cathal the Red-handed O’Conor. Cathal Carrach, at
the head of the Connacians, gave them battle. The English of Ulidia and
Meath were defeated with such slaughter, that of their five battalions
only two survived, and these were pursued from the field of battle to
RINN-DUIN on Lough Ree, in which place John was hemmed in. Many of his
English were killed and others drowned, for they had no mode of effecting
their escape but by crossing the lake in boats.”
It was not, however, long after this event till the English, taking
advantage of the civil wars which raged in Connaught between the sons
of Roderick and the sons of Cathal the Red-handed, got the peninsula of
Rinn-duin into their own hands, and, fortifying it in their own more
skilful manner, erected the noble castle, the ruins of which still
remain, and form the subject of our prefixed illustration. The erection
of this castle is thus recorded in the Annals of the Four Masters:--
“A.D. 1227. Hugh, the son of Roderick O’Conor, and William de Burgo,
marched with a great army to the north of Connaught, burned _Inis
Meadhoin_, plundered the country as they passed along, and took hostages.
Geoffry Mares (or de Marisco), and Turlogh, the son of Roderick O’Conor,
marched with an army into _Magh Aoi_ (county of Roscommon), erected a
castle at RINN-DUIN, and took the hostages of Siol-Muireadhaigh.”
It was at this period also that the lower portion of the peninsula was
artificially insulated as an additional protection to the castle, by a
broad ditch, still to be seen, though no longer filled with water, and
which is connected with a beautiful little harbour for boats, called Safe
Harbour, immediately beneath the castle.
But though, as we have shown, the peninsula of Rinn-duin was thus
fortified by the English, it was not till the power of the O’Conors was
still more broken by their own divisions, that the former were able
to keep permanent possession of it. From a subsequent record in the
Annals of the Four Masters, we find it shortly after in the possession
of Turlogh O’Conor, the son of Roderick, who had been set up by the
English in opposition to his cousin and rival Felim, the son of Cathal
the Red-handed, and by whom he was ultimately slain. This record gives
a curious picture of the mode of warfare of the time, and is worth
presenting to our readers in full:--
“A.D. 1236. Felim, the son of Cathal the Red-handed, returned to
Connaught after his banishment, being invited thither by some of the
Connacians, namely, by O’Kelly, O’Flynn, the son of Hugh, who was son
of Cathal the Red-handed O’Conor, and the son of Art O’Melaghlin, all
forming four equally strong battalions. They marched to RINN-DUIN, where
Brian, the son of Turlogh (O’Conor), Owen O’Heyne, Conor Boy, the son
of Turlogh, and Mac Costelloe, had all the cows of the country; and
Felim’s people got over the enclosures of the _Island_; and the leaders
and subleaders of the army drove off each a proportionate number of the
cows, as they found them on the way before them; and they then dispersed,
carrying off their booty in different directions, and leaving only, of
the four battalions, four horsemen with Felim. As Brian, the son of
Turlogh, Owen O’Heyne, and their troops, perceived that Felim’s army
was scattered, they set out quickly and vigorously with a small party
of horse, and many foot soldiers, to attack Felim and his few horsemen.
Conor Boy, the son of Turlogh, came up with the son of Hugh, who was the
son of Cathal the Red-handed, and with his party; and mistaking them for
his own people, he fell by Roderick, the son of Hugh, who was the son of
Cathal the Red-handed. Felim (the king) strained his voice calling loudly
after his army, and ordering them to return to oppose their enemies.
Many of the host were killed by Felim upon the island; and outside the
island were slain many _bad subjects_, and perpetrators of evil, as they
all were, excepting only Teige, son of Cormac, who was son of Tomaltagh
M’Dermott.”
Our records are too scanty to enable us to trace the history of this
castle and its various possessors with any clearness or consecutive
order. It may, however, be inferred from the subsequent annals that it
fell into the hands of Felim O’Conor after the attack above stated,
and also that he kept possession of it till his death in 1264. During
this period, though harassed by the De Burgos or Burkes, and still more
by factious rivals of his own race, he usually preserved at least the
semblance of peace with the English monarch, and had more than once his
hereditary patrimony of five cantreds of land in Roscommon secured to him
by royal charters. Upon one of those occasions the scene of conference
between the representatives of the British monarch and the Connaught king
was the Castle of Rinn-duin, as thus stated in the Annals of the Four
Masters:--
“A. D. 1256. A lord justice arrived in Ireland from England, and he and
Hugh O’Conor (the son of Felim) held a conference at RINN-DUIN, when a
peace was established between them, on condition that while the lord
justice should retain his office, no part of the province of Connaught
should be taken from O’Conor.”
By the death of Felim, however, the house of O’Conor received a blow
which it never thoroughly recovered; for, though his son Hugh, who
succeeded him in the government, inherited to the full extent his
father’s energy and valour, if not his prudence, he was less successful
in his enterprises, and his death in 1274 gave additional strength to the
English interest in Connaught. From a record in the Annals of the Four
Masters it appears that the Castle of Rinn-duin was in the possession of
the English settlers some years before his death, for it is stated at the
year 1270 that
“The castle of Ath-Angaile, the castle of Sliabh-Lugha, and the castle
of Cill Calman, were demolished by O’Conor; Roscommon, RINN-DUIN, and
Uillin-Uanach, wore also burned by him.”
From this period forward the Castle of Rinn-duin appears to have been
permanently garrisoned by the English, and its history can be traced
only in the English records. In the great roll of the pipe, 1 Edward I.
(1273), among the disbursements of John de Saundford of the escheats and
wards of the Lord the King, it is stated that £12 18s was paid to Geoffry
de Geneville, chief justice of Ireland, for the re-edification and
repairs of the Castle of Rendon; and also that 45 shillings were paid to
Master Rico le Charpentier (or the carpenter) for 40 stone and 5 pounds
of steel for the construction of a certain mill at the same place. Again,
in the account of the expenses of the same Geoffry de Geneville, from
Wednesday next after the Assumption of the Virgin, anno 1 Edward I., to
Michaelmas, 2 Edward I. (1273 to 1274), the following item occurs:--
“For the Castle of Rendon, to pay for the garrison
and other necessaries £439 0 3¼”
So in the account of Robert de Ufford, chief justice of Ireland, of
all receipts, expenses, &c., delivered by Adam de Wettenhall into the
Exchequer, from Christmas to Michaelmas, 4 Edward I. (1276), among
the items are allowances for supplies of victuals for the garrison
of Ren-duin, the construction of a mill, and other works of a new
construction, the repairing of a fosse there, &c. Again, in the accounts
for the following year, 1277, the following item occurs:--
“To Richard de Marisco, for works in the fosse and
castle of Rendon £7 10 0”
And in the pipe roll of the 8th Edward I. there are similar accounts of
disbursements for repairs to this fortress.
These notices are perhaps of little general interest, but they afford
conclusive evidences of the ancient importance of this fastness, and the
value set upon its possession as necessary to the support of the English
interests in Connaught. The same records preserve the names of three of
its constables, viz:--
Walter le Enfant was constable in 1285-87.
Richard Fitz-Simon Fitz-Richar was constable, with the annual fee of £40,
in 1326.
John de Funtayns was constable, with the same fee, in 1334.
It appears that during the reigns of the first three Edwards, Rinn-duin
became the seat of a town of some importance; and it was also the seat
of a parish church and two monastic establishments, of which one was a
priory for Knights Hospitallers, or for Cross-bearers, which, according
to Ware, was said to have been founded in the reign of King John, and, as
some writers say, by his express command. Be this, however, as it may,
Philip de Angulo, or Costelloe, was a great benefactor to it in the reign
of Henry III., if not actually, as it is probable, its founder.
From the Annals of the Four Masters we learn that the celebrated Irish
historian and topographer John More O’Dugan died, “among the monks of
John the Baptist,” in this monastery in 1372. He was the hereditary
antiquary of Hy Maine, or O’Kelly’s country, and author of the
topographical and historical poem reciting the names of the principal
tribes and districts in Meath, Ulster, and Connaught, with the names of
the chiefs who presided over them at the close of the twelfth century, as
well as of several other works of great value which have descended to our
times.
In 1305, the Prior of this abbey sued Odo, the Prior of Athlone, for the
advowson of the vicarage of the church of Randowne.--_Rol. P. B. T. No.
52._
The other abbey is said to have been founded under the invocation of the
Holy Trinity for Præmonstre Canons, by Clarus Mac Moylin O’Maolchonry,
Archdeacon of Elphin, about the year 1215.
Of all these structures, as well military as religious and domestic,
there only remain at present deserted and time-worn ruins, but these
ruins are of great interest, and speak most eloquently of the past. The
most important feature amongst them is the castle, which occupies a
rocky eminence, rising abruptly from the water on the shore of the small
inlet called Safe Harbour, in which it may be presumed that the armed
vessels employed upon Lough Ree found security under the walls of the
fortress. This castle is well described by Mr Weld, in his excellent
Survey of Roscommon, as being built nearly in the form of the letter
P, the tail of the letter being short in proportion, and occupied by
a spacious apartment for banqueting or assembly. In the head of the
letter, next the upright stem, is placed the keep, a lofty, massive,
and before the use of artillery, impregnable structure: it has a court
before it to the east, which was defended along the curve by a strong
wall, with banquette and parapet, and ditches of great depth, on the
outer side. The line represented by the stem of the letter, stretching in
a direction across the point, is in length above two hundred and forty
feet, and is protected at its base by that great artificial fosse which
insulated this lower portion of the peninsula and the castle as already
stated, but which is now nearly dry, the level having been altered by the
rubbish which has fallen into it from the ruins. Nearly in the centre of
this line appear the remains of abutments, both on the castle and outer
side of the fosse, marking the site of the draw-bridge, and opposite to
a small gateway in the castle wall. “The keep,” Mr Weld observes, “as
beheld both on the land side and from the lake, presents a very imposing
mass, its outer walls being entire, and its great tower rising to a very
considerable elevation: but the edifice on the land side appears almost
shapeless, owing to the extraordinary luxuriance of the ivy with which it
is overrun, originating from two vast flatted stems which spring up over
the base of the walls, just over the long fosse. I had the curiosity to
measure them, and found the one to be four feet six inches, and the other
seven feet five inches broad, presenting, though with many sinuosities,
an undivided face of bark, from side to side, and still growing with
great vigour. I cannot call to recollection having seen a more vast and
uninterrupted mass of ivy foliage.
The great tower is about fifty feet broad next the fosse: in the
upper story, traces of windows appear through the ivy, and of small
watch-towers at the angles. Like the other great castles of the country,
it was evidently destroyed by violence; and nothing short of the powerful
effects of gunpowder could have cast down the prodigious fragments of
masonry which stand insulated in the inner court. The view of the castle
is extremely pleasing from the water, and more particularly so, when
the sheltered harbour beneath its walls receives a little fleet of the
beautiful sailing pleasure-boats which are used upon this lake, the
gaiety of whose ensigns and painted sides forms a remarkable contrast to
the sombre tints of the ancient ivied walls, and the grey rocks on which
they repose.”
A short distance to the east of the castle, the remains of a round
watch-tower, as it would appear to be, crown the summit of a promontory
which is the highest point of the peninsula. Its diameter within is about
fourteen feet, and the walls are four feet thick. The entrance and the
window opposite to it face the water, and command most pleasing views up
and down the lake. The window, surmounted by a flat rounded arch, about
seven feet in height, is more spacious than such as are usually seen in a
building of this kind, and affords ample light to the chamber. Tho ground
between this promontory and the eminence occupied by the castle is low
and marshy, and water probably once flowed over it.
In addition to the fosse already described, the castle, and indeed the
whole peninsula, was further protected by a great wall which crossed
from one side to the other. According to Mr Weld’s measurements, this
wall is 564 yards in length from water to water, its distance from the
castle-fosse being 700 yards. “Nearly in the middle of it is an arched
gateway, with its defences still tolerably entire, twenty-four feet deep,
and presenting a front of twenty-one feet: between this gate and the
water at either side there are square towers, at unequal intervals of
from sixty to ninety yards, advanced about thirteen feet beyond the line
of the walls, and being in breadth about fifteen feet: in the interior
the dimensions are about eight feet six inches. These towers doubtless
afforded stations for the archers, and also facilitated the access to the
parapet and banquette of the wall. Whether there ever had been a fosse
on the outer side, I am unable to say; the probability is, that there
was; but if so, the ground has been levelled, and the rank luxuriance of
vegetation has obliterated its lines. The building of the wall, however,
appears in many parts to have been hastily executed, and cement to have
been sparingly used, yet it still remains a most interesting monument of
the military works of past ages.”
Of the ecclesiastical edifices of Rinn-duin, but small remains exist, and
as their names are lost to tradition, it is difficult now to identify
them with certainty. The principal ruin, which is situated near the
draw-bridge over the great fosse, on the land side, is most probably
the church erected in the commencement of the thirteenth century, and
dedicated to the Holy Trinity. Neither windows nor doorways exist to
give any idea of its style, but its walls are in sufficient preservation
to show the form and dimensions of the building. Like most important
Irish churches it consists of a nave and choir; the nave is sixty feet
long and twenty-four feet wide, the choir thirty-three feet long and
eighteen wide. This church, it may be presumed, stood in a conspicuous
part of the town; but not a vestige now remains of any other edifice,
either ecclesiastical or domestic, between the castle and the fortified
wall across the isthmus. The rude remains of the other ecclesiastical
buildings are situated on the outer side of the fortified wall, and are
connected with a burial-ground still much used; but there is nothing in
these remains worthy of particular notice.
A desire to supply, as far as in our power, a chasm in our local
histories, has induced us to extend our notice of the remains of
Rinn-duin to a greater length than that usually allotted to our
topographical papers, the history of these remains having been hitherto
involved in great darkness. Dr Ledwich, in his account of the castle,
written for Grose’s Antiquities of Ireland, briefly states that there are
no memorials of its structure! And even Mr Weld, the latest writer who
has described this locality, remarks, that “as to its past history, it
is involved in a mysterious and perhaps now impenetrable obscurity.” By
the publication, for the first time, of much matter hitherto locked-up
in manuscript records, we have, as we trust, thrown no small additional
light on the history of these interesting remains; and we have only to
add, that for the documents which we have used, we are in part indebted
to the kindness of Sir W. Betham, and still more to that of our friend
Mr O’Donovan, who has allowed us the use of his translation of the
unpublished Annals of the Four Masters.