CASTLEGREGORY & MAHAREES

Caislean Ghriaire

This material is excerpted from "The Dingle Peninsula: History, Folklore, Archaeology" by Steve MacDonough, copyright 1993, published by Brandon Book Publishers, Ltd., Dingle, Co. Kerry, Ireland. Each of its 260 pages is packed with information on the communities of the Dingle Peninsula, and in its entirety, it makes very interesting reading. The book is widely available for purchase throughout the Peninsula.

Castlegregory is the capital of Lettragh, the northern side of the Dingle Peninsula. Its population is little more than a quarter of what it was shortly before the Famine, but it remains the only place of the area that possesses the unity and proportion of a real village.

The castle from which the name comes was built in the mid 16th Century by Gregory Hoare, but it is no longer standing. There has long been a tradition that the name derived from the late 6th Century pope, Saint Gregory the Great, known as Gregory Goldenmouth and claimed to be of the Corca Dhuibhne people. However, Pope Gregory was probably confused with another Saint Gregory who was Irish and associated with the Iveragh Peninsula; Gregory Hoare is the much more likely source of the placename.

There is a story associated with the castle which is reminiscent of the relationship between the Montagues and Capulets in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet". Gregory Hoare had a feud with a neighbour called Moore. In the face of parental fury Hugh, Gregory's son, married Moore's duaghter Ellen in 1566. As they returned to the castle from the wedding, Gregory stood at the gate but his son pushed past him and the unfortunate Gregory fell dead on the spot.

In 1580 part of Lord Grey of Wilton's army – including, it is said, Edmund Spenser, Walter Raleigh and Edward Denny – stayed at the castle on their way to besiege Dún an Óir. Outraged at her husband entertaining the enemy, Hoare's wife, Ellen, went to the cellar and ran off all the wine from the barrels there. Hugh Hoare attacked her and stabbed her to death. Next morning he was summoned to appear before his overlords to answer a charge of murder, but he fell dead as he passed the very place where his father had died 14 years earlier.

A later marriage, of "Black" Hugh's daughter, transferred the castle to Walter Hussey of Dingle. He supported the Knight of Kerry in the Cromwellian wars and was pursued by Wilmot's forces from Castlegregory to Minard across the mountains. He died in the destruction of Minard Castle and the Husseys were ruined. The castle – "slighted" by the English army – and the estate at Castlegregory were settled first on a Cromwellian soldier, then passed to a Derry man who settled locally, and were bought by the first Lord Ventry in whose family they remained until 1913.

EARLY CHRISTIAN REMAINS

For those interested in the early Christian settlements, it is especially worthwhile to try to persuade someone to take them over to Illauntannig – Oileán tSeanaig. The best thing to do is simply to enquire locally. The early settlement of Seanach is one of the finest of its kind. The enclosing wall, or cashel, is exceptionally strong – about 18 feet thick – though part of it has fallen to the erosion of the sea. In the larger of the two ruined oratories there is an altar and the window survives; there are clocháin, from one of which a souterrain runs to a chamber in the enclosure wall. There are cross-slabs; and particularly prominent features are three quartz-covered leachts, rectangular burial platforms. By the shore, a hundred yards from the cashel, is a bullán with an incised cross. A two-storey farmhouse on the island was occupied until the 1950s; and it is known locally as Learie's Island after the people who lived there.

GLANTEENASSIG

South of Castlegregory are mountains and valleys. Glanteenassig – Gleannta ana Easig, the valleys of the waterfall – has a substantial forestry development and is one of the most beautiful places on the peninsula on a fine day. It is possible to drive right into the deep valley, which resembles the scenery of Killarney and of County Wicklow more than that of the rest of the peninsula. Peaks and corrie cliffs rise steeply from lakes, and the river meanders, forming oxbow bends, through a long valley which is by turns bleak and rocky, brown and green with planted trees.

Lough Slat, Doon Lough and Lough Caum, which attract local anglers, possess a sense of calm amidst the power of massive corrie headwalls. Much of the surrounding forest is pine, but there are other trees and shrubs, especially holly, a characteristic of what was oak forest before the 17th Century, by which time the forests had been cut down to provide timber for building the British navy and to an extent also for fuel for industry.

Deep in the valley a house stands at a bend in the road; walkers can take the well-built stony track which winds up the hill of Doon from beside the house. This track continues as far as a turf-cutting area, but an earlier track swings southwest to a low point on the shoulder south of the mountain ridge where it then drops down into Ballynahunt, near Annascaul. According to some accounts, it was by this route that the Cromwellian forces crossed the mountains from Castlegregory to Minard Castle, though others favour the route by Maghanaboe; but for the walker who likes to get up into the hills it is simply an excellent route to take across the mountains.