Antrim, Ulster, Ireland

History

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According to tradition, a monastery was founded at Antrim in AD 495, thirty years after the death of Saint Patrick, to take forward his ministry, with a small settlement growing up around it. The round tower (see below), also known as "the Steeple", is all that remains. In the Middle Ages, the area was part of the Gaelic territory of Dál Araide which covered much of what is now County Antrim. At the eastern edge of town is a ringfort called Rathmore (Ráth Mór, "the great fort"), which was the royal residence of the kings of Dál Araide.

By 1596, an English settlement had grown up around a ford across the Sixmilewater River. The All Saints Parish Church has a datestone of 1596 with the words 'Gall-Antrum' carved on it – this could be translated as 'The Antrum of the English/foreigner'. Hugh Clotworthy, father of the Anglo-Irish politician John Clotworthy, 1st Viscount Massereene, supervised the building of secure military quarters beside the old Norman motte. This later became the site of Antrim Castle. Hugh was knighted in 1617 and appointed High Sheriff of County Antrim.

A battle was fought near Antrim between the English and Irish in the reign of Edward III; and in 1642 a naval engagement took place on Lough Neagh, for Viscount Massereene and Ferrard (who founded Antrim Castle in 1662) had a right to maintain a fighting fleet on the lough.

The Society of United Irishmen launched a rebellion in 1798, which began in Leinster and quickly spread to Ulster. The United Irishmen had been founded in 1791 by liberal Protestants in Belfast. Its goal was to unite Catholics and Protestants and to end British monarchical rule over Ireland and to found a sovereign, independent Irish republic. Although its membership was mainly Catholic, many of its leaders and members in northeast Ulster were Protestant Presbyterians. On 7 June 1798, about 4000 United Irishmen led by Henry Joy McCracken attacked the town. The rebels were on the verge of taking the town until British reinforcements arrived. Thanks to a rebel band led by James Hope, most of the United Irishmen were able to withdraw safely. This is known as the Battle of Antrim.

Before the Act of Union, Antrim returned two members to parliament by virtue of letters patent granted in 1666 by Charles II.

Dunluce Castle

In the 13th century, Richard Óg de Burgh, 2nd Earl of Ulster, built the first castle at Dunluce.

It is first documented in the hands of the McQuillan family in 1513. The earliest features of the castle are two large drum towers about 9 metres (30 ft) in diameter on the eastern side, both relics of a stronghold built here by the McQuillans after they became lords of the Route.

The McQuillans were the Lords of Route from the late 13th century until they were displaced by the MacDonnell after losing two major battles against them during the mid- and late-16th century.

 
The castle in the last decade of the 19th century
Later Dunluce Castle became the home of the chief of the Clan MacDonnell of Antrim and the Clan MacDonald of Dunnyveg from Scotland. Chief John Mor MacDonald was the second son of Good John of Islay, Lord of the Isles, 6th chief of Clan Donald in Scotland. John Mor MacDonald l was born through John of Islay's second marriage to Princess Margaret Stewart, daughter of King Robert II of Scotland. In 1584, on the death of James MacDonald the 6th chief of the Clan MacDonald of Antrim and Dunnyveg, the Antrim Glens were seized by Sorley Boy MacDonnell, one of his younger brothers. Sorley Boy took the castle, keeping it for himself and improving it in the Scottish style. Sorley Boy swore allegiance to Queen Elizabeth I and his son Randal was made 1st Earl of Antrim by King James I.

Four years later, the Girona, a galleass from the Spanish Armada, was wrecked in a storm on the rocks nearby. The cannons from the ship were installed in the gatehouses and the rest of the cargo sold, the funds being used to restore the castle. MacDonnell's granddaughter Rose was born in the castle in 1613.

A local legend states that at one point, part of the kitchen next to the cliff face collapsed into the sea, after which the wife of the owner refused to live in the castle any longer. According to a legend, when the kitchen fell into the sea, only a kitchen boy survived, as he was sitting in the corner of the kitchen which did not collapse. However, the kitchen is still intact and next to the manor house. You can still see the oven, fireplace and entry ways into it. It wasn't until some time in the 18th century that the north wall of the residence building collapsed into the sea. The east, west and south walls still stand.

Dunluce Castle served as the seat of the Earl of Antrim until the impoverishment of the MacDonnells in 1690, following the Battle of the Boyne. Since that time, the castle has deteriorated and parts were scavenged to serve as materials for nearby buildings.

History

This spectacular castlecrowned crag on the famous north Antrim coast was shaped when the sea cut deep into the land, exploiting cracks on either side of the rock.

The nomadic boatmen - Ireland's first inhabitants - who crossed from south-west Scotland in about 7,000 BC and left their flinty axes all along this rugged coast, must have seen the crag from the sea and may have ventured their flimsy coracles into the huge cave that runs through the rock to the land. You can still visit it by boat today.

The early Christians and the Vikings were drawn to this romantic place and an early Irish fort once stood here. For its crowning glory, however, the crag had to await the coming of those master-builders, the Normans. They had a habit of consolidating their victories by building castles, and they knew a good site when they saw one.

The battling MacDonnells ruled all this north-eastern corner of Ulster in the, late 16th century. Steeped in myth and legend and inhabited by giants, ghosts and banshees wailing through the sea mist, it has the most dramatic coastline in the British Isles, a veritable textbook illustrating the geological story of the earth. The ancient rocks stick out as brightly coloured cliffs along the edge of the plateau. There are red sandstones, white chalk, black basalt and blue clavs.

Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster, first built this castle at Dunluce. It often came under siege. In 1584 Sorley Boy MacDonnell captured it from the English when one of his men, employed in the castle, hauled his comrades up the cliff in a basket.

Sorley Boy came into some money in 1588 when the Spanish Armada treasure ship Girona was wrecked by storm off the Giant's Causeway. He used it to modernise the castle but he must have skimped on the kitchen, since in 1639 it fell into the sea and carried away the cooks and all their pots. Today the pretty blue flower of Dunluce' clusters round the castle's ruined shell and drifts of seapinks are the only sentinels.

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