Dunluce Castle

OVERVIEW

A ruined castle on a rock stack joined to the mainland by a bridge, between Portballintrae and Portrush on the north Antrim coast, the seat of the MacQuillans and then of the MacDonnells, with the Mermaid's Cave beneath it. It is in state care and open to visitors; the tourism boards of Northern Ireland and Ireland tell its legends.

HISTORY

Sorley Boy MacDonnell took it in the 1550s and the family held it into the seventeenth century, abandoning it after the Williamite war; the town below it, sacked in 1641, has been excavated. The tradition that part of the kitchen fell into the sea one stormy night in 1639, killing the servants and sparing a boy, is not in the record, which shows a kitchen still on the landward side.

REPORTED ACTIVITY

Maeve Roe, a MacQuillan daughter locked in the north tower for refusing a match and drowned with her lover escaping through the cave, is heard keening and seen sweeping the tower; a soldier and a lord are added in some tellings. It is legend told on tourism pages, with no event behind it, and the row is marked accordingly.

VISITING

Open daily, ticketed; steep and exposed. The Causeway Coast path passes it.