The site began as a motte, later giving way to a small stone castle that appears on the Down Survey maps of 1656-8. The terrier accompanying these maps records that Gerald Linch of the Knock, Valerian Weisley of Dangan, and Richard Linehan jointly owned 446 acres here, describing the property as “a small stone castle in repair with some cabins about it”, along with the ruins of a chapel or church and a bridge carrying the highway from Trim to Kilcock over the River Evernocke.

The castle may have been constructed by the Linehan family, though by 1640 the Civil Survey indicates that the local vicar, Mr. Bunning, held possession of the glebe lands, including “a castle with a backside”, possibly meaning a bakehouse. The building likely served as a tower house, typical of Irish defensive architecture from the late medieval period, with evidence suggesting multiple phases of construction over its lifetime.

The site gained its most famous resident in 1700 when Jonathan Swift became rector of Laracor church, living here until his appointment as Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin in 1713, though he continued visiting less frequently until his death in 1745. By the 19th century, Ordnance Survey maps marked the structure as “Dean Swift’s Glebe House (in Ruins)”. Today, all that remains is a conserved masonry pier measuring 2.5 metres east to west and standing 3.1 metres high, with a smaller projecting pier attached to its south side. An 1847 illustration shows the structure much as it appears now, though it then featured external rebates that once supported a gable, silent testimony to the castle that once stood here.