County: Down Site name: GREENCASTLE
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: —
Author: Mr. C.J. Lynn, Historic Monuments Branch, Ministry of Finance
Site type: Castle - Anglo-Norman masonry castle
Period/Dating: Late Medieval (AD 1100-AD 1599)
ITM: E 730118m, N 814069m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.059319, -6.012449
A small trial-trench was opened across the line of the ditch on the south side of the castle at the point when one might have expected to find a dam-like feature corresponding to that revealed previously in the E. ditch. No masonry structure was found but the rock, here much harder than on the E., had apparently been left unquarried across the line of the ditch. The solid rock was encountered 9ft higher than it should have if the ditch bottom had run through at this point at a depth similar to that on the E. side. The rock spanning the ditch-line was at precisely the same level as the top of the dam on the east side. The cutting was not wide enough to indicate the immediate extent of this apparent rise in the ditch bottom however the results support the contention that the wall spanning the ditch on the east side could have been designed to function hydrostatically as a dam.
