Information Thurles Ireland
Thurles (in Irish: Durlas Eile, which means “Fort of Eile”) is a Co Tipperary town located on the River Suir. Eile in Irish means “other”, but this has no bearing on the name of the town (which is pronounced differently). Its name actually comes from the ancient inhabitants of the territory named the Eli. There is very little information on this prehistoric ethnic group, other than apocryphal legends and myths. The Eli were at their strongest around the fifth century AD and their territory reached from Croghan Hill in Offaly to Cashel. Both Irish placenames feature the name Eli in their titles. The town has a population of roughly eight thousand. Twinned with both Bollington in England and Salt Lake City, in Utah, in the United States, Thurles was originally a market town, and a strong fort owned by the O'Fogarty clan. The O’Fogarty clan owned an area that included the Devil’s Bit and Templemore. Thurles is the birthplace of the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association), although Irish sport had been played in a less official capacity for centuries before the inception of the organisation. Lar na Pairce hosts a presentation of Gaelic games. You will learn that hurling has been played in Ireland for at least two millennia. The world’s oldest hurley is among the artefacts in the Sam Melbourne collection. Gaelic football, meanwhile, has been around for three hundred years. Near the museum stands the Hayes Hotel, where the GAA was founded. Ballynalow Castle (built for the Purcell family) is three miles from Thurles. It is a good example of a round tower house, more common in the southern part of Ireland than elsewhere. Some of its main windows have musket holes beside them. Other architectural points of interest include a winding staircase and latrines. It is an early sixteenth century building.
Attractions Thurles Ireland
Cahir Castle - Cahir
Located at Castle Street, Cahir, is one of Ireland's largest and best preserved castles. It is situated on a rocky island in the river Suir. The Castle's attractions include an excellent audio-visual show called 'Partly Hidden and Partly Revealed' in English, French, German and Italian, informing visitors about all the main sites of the area.
Carrick On Suir Heritage Centre - Carrick-On-Suir
This former Protestant church, now restored as a heritage centre, was once part of the Pre-Reformation burial ground and church site of Carrick Mor. Its interesting gravestones include a memorial to Thomas Butler, an illegitimate son of Thomas, tenth Earl of Ormonde. Dorothea Herbert, daughter of the eighteenth century rector and author of 'Retrospections' is also buried here.
Cashel Folk Village - Cashel
Located at Dominick Street, Cashel, it has a delightful series of informal reconstructions of various traditional thatched village shops, a forge and other business. It is housed within the town of Cashel, near by the famed Rock of Cashel.
Mitchelstown Cave - Cahir
Located at Burncourt, Cahir, is considered one of the most spectacular caves in Europe. The caves have three massive caverns, in which the visitor is surrounded by indescribable drip stone formations, stalactites, stalagmites and huge calcite columns.
Ormond Castle - Carrick
Located at Castle Park, Carrick on Suir, is one of the finest examples of an Elizabethan manor house in Ireland. It was built by Thomas, the tenth Earl of Ormond in the 1560s. Closely integrated into the manor house are two fifteenth century towers. It is the country's only major unfortified dwelling from that turbulent period. The state rooms contain some of the finest decorative plasterwork in the country, including plasterwork portraits. Access to the castle is by guided tour only, with a maximum number of twenty people at one time.
