On an island between the two Lough Ernes, Enniskillen Castle has for centuries guarded one of the few passages into the heart of Ulster. A Gaelic lock of the Maguires, destroyed during the Nine Years' War, it was reborn under the Plantation as the heart of a colony town — a synthesis, in a single place, of the conquest and colonisation of Ulster.
The Maguires' lock
Founded around the 1420s by the Maguires, lords of Fermanagh, Enniskillen commanded a strategic passage into Gaelic Ulster, protected by the waters of Lough Erne. During the Nine Years' War (1594-1603), the great Gaelic revolt against the Tudor Crown, the castle was bitterly disputed, taken and retaken. In 1602, it was deliberately dismantled — by an English force and Niall Garbh O'Donnell — to deny it to the enemy. The destruction of Enniskillen marks the end of the Maguires' power, swept away by the Tudor reconquest.
The heart of a plantation town
After the Flight of the Earls (1607) — the departure into exile of the great Gaelic chiefs, which opened the way to the Plantation —, Enniskillen was rebuilt for the constable and English planter William Cole, becoming the heart of the new plantation town. It is from this phase that the famous Watergate with its twin turrets dates, the emblem of the castle: an elegant water gate, half-defensive, half-ornamental, in the Plantation style. Enniskillen thus embodies the whole turning of Ulster: from a destroyed Gaelic bastion to a rebuilt colonial stronghold. To see: the twin-turreted Watergate, the medieval Maguire keep, the ramparts on the island between the two Lough Ernes, the museums housed there today.
Did you know?
The twin-turreted Watergate of Enniskillen, today an emblematic image of the town, is not medieval but a work of the Plantation: it was built in the seventeenth century, after the castle's rebuilding by the colonists. Thus, the most photographed monument in Fermanagh symbolises not the old Gaelic Ireland of the Maguires, but the new Ulster born of the Jacobean colonisation — a fine irony of history, carved in stone at the water's edge.
Notes
Enniskillen Castle lies at Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, on an island between the Lough Ernes; castle and museums (including the Fermanagh County Museum) open to the public. Hours to check.
Quiz
- Which Gaelic family held Enniskillen?
- The Maguires (lords of Fermanagh)
- The MacDonnells
- The Tudors
- What did the castle undergo in 1602?
- It was deliberately dismantled (Nine Years' War)
- It was enlarged
- It was sold
- From when does the famous Watergate date?
- From the Plantation phase (seventeenth century)
- From Roman times
- From the Gaelic Middle Ages