Church, and is situated about four miles north of Dublin. It is a very curious mixture of the castle, dwelling-house, and chapel or church, which last, in fact, forms a comparatively small part of the building. The date is probably the latter part of the thirteenth century, or the beginning of the fourteenth. In plan it is oblong, with a large square central tower, which has regular battlements of the usual Irish type in corbie-steps, evidently intended for use and not for ornament; the windows are small loops square-topped, just the same as those of the ordinary tower-houses. The chapel forms the eastern limb of the ground floor of the building; it has an east window of two lights, with mouldings of the fourteenth century; on the north side are single lancet-windows, on the south they are of two lights of the same style as the east window. It has a stone vault with habitable chambers above it in the roof, which is of ashlar masonry, and is remarkably high-pitched, reaching nearly to the top of the tower. There are other dwelling-rooms in the western division and in the tower; at the west end there are six small windows, one over the other, indicating that this portion of the building was divided into that number of small low rooms. The doorway is in a sort of shallow porch under a stair-turret projecting from the north-west corner of the tower, but extending only up to the second story; in this turret are several small windows, of single lights, trefoil-headed. The staircase is connected with the tower by a passage corbelled out in a singular manner, and has loopholes in the upper part; there are fireplaces and other marks of habitation in the chambers. The whole dimensions of this very singular building are only forty feet long by sixteen wide, external measure. It is remarkably lofty in proportion to its size. Near the church is the well-room, a curious small octagonal building with a dome-shaped vault, from which project four pointed dormers with stone roofs, and each with a small lancet-window, the head triangular, and under each window is a large cruciform loophole, excepting on one side, where there is a door. The whole structure appears to be of the thirteenth century. Adjoining to this is a small oblong chamber or bath-room called "St. Catharine's Pond," which has a pointed barrel-vault and a doorway, evidently of the thirteenth century also.
All the abbeys were fortified, and it was a general custom to have dwelling-rooms in the roofs of the churches above the vaults, but they hardly come within the description of domestic buildings, otherwise many of them might be described as partaking of that character. Bective Abbey is strongly fortified, and the original part is of the twelfth century. Holy Cross Abbey, near Thurles, co. Tipperary, has the ruins of a nave of the twelfth, but the greater part, including the beautiful
