A Case Study of the Irish Hall House – Moylough, Shrule & Tomdeely

Laura Leahy

Figure 1: Shrule Castle, Co. Mayo (photo: L Leahy )

This thesis is concerned with an in-depth analysis of the castellated structure that is the hall house. To date, a complete study of the Irish hall house has been neglected. It was thought that these two storey stone structures, which were mostly constructed in the west of Ireland during the 13 ^th century, are precursors to the later tower house.  They are very often believed to resemble their contemporary, the hall keep and also their apparent ascendants the tower house and are often classified as both such buildings.

The primary aim of this thesis is to segregate the hall house as a separate entity of its own and secondly to answer questions about their dating, function, siting, social environment and defences. In doing this, it can be noted if the function of the hall house was to be a manorial centre and residence for an Anglo-Norman lord with agricultural holdings being based around the hall house or if their function was primarily defensive.

I will be using three hall houses within my study, namely Moylough in Co. Galway, Shrule in Co. Mayo and Tomdeely in Co. Limerick which were all constructed within the 13 ^th century by the Anglo-Normans and are to be included within this thesis to demonstrate the varying functions of the hall house.  I therefore aim to prove the hypothesis that hall houses are a unique structure and can no more be classified as hall keeps or tower houses. 

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