ABSTRACT
One of the difficulties with trying to grapple with the problem is that of agreeing how we might recognise an Irish castle. To be identified at all as a castle the site must obviously be different from earlier Irish ones. If it is, and thus relates to English castles, how are we to tell if it was Irish-owned or built? There are no contemporary surveys of Irish lands or estates, which would name castles for us, while the Annals name few places; arguing from such silence is clearly no good. It usually comes down to making a statement as to where the boundaries of English and Irish lordships lay, and then arguing that sites within the Irish lands were Irish.
