The Round Tower of Kilmacduagh

The first time we came here, twenty years ago, I had to make do by taking aim with my camera, just as any would-be plunderer of the twelfth century might have, from ground level.

Catapults and siege engines would have made short work of that lofty fortress, but somehow the Kilmacduagh Round Tower, near Gort in County Galway, has endured. To this day it remains one of Ireland’s best-preserved round towers, rising from the quiet monastery ruins like a sentinel from another age.

There are all sorts of theories about how this thousand-year-old tower has survived unscathed. Most point to the high entrance, several metres above the ground, as clever defence against the Normans and other marauders. But perhaps the truth is simpler, as Kilmacduagh’s remote setting may have spared it the attention of both invasion and ambition.

This time around, my arsenal of “siege engines” is a little more advanced, and I was able to capture a view any twelfth-century plunderer would have thought nothing short of magic.


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