The Castle
Redwood Castle is the oldest occupied castle in Ireland where the present owners are Kinfolk of the owners of more than 600 years ago.
It was built by Normans (the De Cogans) about 1210 and occupied by them until 1350. In 1350 it came into the hands of the local rulers, the O’Kennedys, who installed the Egans, the leading Irish Family of Brehons – Lawyers and Professors. The Egans built the castle upward, installing a few more floors to the edifice.
In addition to Redwood Castle, at Ballymacegan in Ormond (now Tipperary), the Egans ran law schools at Park and Duniry in County Galway. Most surviving legal manuscripts as well as some important non-legal manuscripts were produced at the MacEgan schools. The associated link to excerpts and a map from Fergus Kelly’s “A Guide to Early Irish Law” and the link to excerpts from Conor McHale’s “The Bardic Families of Ireland” illustrate the prominence of the Egans as leading Brehon lawyers during that time.
Redwood enjoyed a robust period for more than 300 years until Oliver Cromwell’s forces showed up in Ireland in or around 1649. As with many other Irish castles, Cromwell’s forces set fire to the building and destroyed the wooden floors and roof. However, the stone barrel-vaulted arch ceiling over the third floor survived as did the castle’s stone walls. The Redwood Lectures will be delivered under that vaulted ceiling.
Redwood sat in ruin for 350 years until Michael J. Egan, a lawyer from County Mayo, bought the building in 1972 (ironically, from the O’Kennedys) and restored it, including the Main Hall which sits above the vaulted ceiling.
Now, 375 years after Cromwell caused a temporary stop to the tradition, we are thrilled to return to Redwood and convene these lectures featuring some of the foremost scholars in the field of medieval Irish history, law, and society.
