Historical records paint a picture of a substantial fortified complex that dominated this landscape for centuries. By the 1470s, the castle served as the residence of Roland FitzEustace, though the family’s fortunes would prove turbulent. James Eustace forfeited the property in 1581, but the estate was restored to John Eustace in 1603, when official grants describe an impressive compound featuring ‘two castles, a hall, one garden, the orchard, the haggard place, one chapel upon a vault, one churchyard’. A 1620 reference confirms the presence of ‘two castles with divers turrets’, suggesting a formidable defensive structure that would have commanded respect from any approaching visitor.

The castle’s decline was gradual but decisive. In 1884, much of the structure was dismantled for building materials, a common fate for many Irish castles whose stone proved too valuable to leave standing. By 2000, only a short stretch of thick limestone rubble wall survived, standing two storeys high at 3.7 metres north to south and 1.6 metres thick. The masonry showed signs of different building phases; roughly coursed long, thin flags near the base, a small area infilled with mortared red brick at first floor level, and what appeared to be a later addition of a tall batter on the western face. Even this modest remnant couldn’t withstand time’s pressure, collapsing in early 2010 to leave just a one metre high fragment.

Today, visitors to the site can still trace the castle’s footprint through its earthworks. The ruins sit on the southern end of a raised square platform measuring 25 metres on each side, defined by a low scarp about a metre high. A wide earthen ramp, 8.5 metres across, extends north from the northeastern corner of this raised area. To the south, extensive earthworks and traces of a canal reveal the ambitious 17th and 18th century landscaping that once transformed these grounds into formal gardens, a testament to the site’s evolution from medieval fortress to gentleman’s estate.