Bunratty Lower

Bunratty Lower is a barony located in County Clare, Ireland. This ancient unit of land division is in turn divided into fourteen civil parishes.

Legal context

Baronies were created after the Norman invasion of Ireland as divisions of counties and were used the administration of justice and the raising of revenue. While baronies continue to be officially defined units, they have been administratively obsolete since 1898. However, they continue to be used in land registration and in specification, such as in planning permissions. In many cases, a barony corresponds to an earlier Gaelic túath which had submitted to the Crown.

Landscape

Bunratty Lower is a division of the former barony of Bunratty. This belonged to the Macnamara family, and was called Dangan-i-vigin. It is bounded by the barony of Bunratty Upper (to the north) and by the barony of Tulla Lower (to the east). To the south, the River Shannon separates it from County Limerick. To the west, the River Fergus separates it from the baronies of Clonderalaw and Islands. The barony covers an area of 69,083 acres (27,957 ha), of which 11,623 acres (4,704 ha) are tideway. The land is rocky, but able to support large numbers of sheep.

Bunratty

Bunratty (Irish: Bun na Raite, meaning "End of the Raite river") is a civil parish in County Clare, Ireland, and a small village by the same name. The village is located next to a major tourist attraction, Bunratty Castle, on the N18 connecting Limerick to Galway. The Raite river defines the eastern boundary of the parish, and flows into the Shannon Estuary, which defines the southern boundary.

History

The first settlement in Bunratty may have been set up by Vikings in the 10th century. The Annals of the Four Masters report that Brian Boru destroyed a Viking settlement in the area in 977.

Around 1250 the Anglo-Norman ruler Mucegros was given the right to hold a market and fair at Bunratty. He built the castle in 1277. The castle became the main residence of Richard de Clare, owner of all of Thomond. In the late 13th century, Bunrattty had about 1,000 inhabitants. Richard de Clare was killed in 1311, and in 1314 the town of Bunratty was burned to the ground by the local people. The castle was sacked in 1332.