Dunineny Castle Ruins, Clare Road, Ballycastle, Co Antrim is a listed building in the Causeway Coast and Glens local planning authority area, Northern Ireland.
Dunineny Castle Ruins, Clare Road, Ballycastle, Co Antrim
- WRENN ID
- first-basalt-pearl
- Grade
- Local Planning Authority
- Causeway Coast and Glens
- Constituency
- North Antrim MP: Jim Allister (TUV)
- Country
- Northern Ireland
- Irish grid reference
- D 113 419
- Coordinates
- 55.2116, -6.25103
- Source
- NI Environment Agency listing
Description
The ruins of Dunineny Castle are a medieval coastal castle, likely built before 1600, situated on a cliff top promontory overlooking Rathlin Sound at a place called Castle Point in the Town Parks area of Ballycastle, County Antrim. Constructed on a triangular piece of ground, the castle’s history is intertwined with the power struggles between the McQuillans, McDonnells, and McGregors. It's thought the McDonnells built a series of small castles along the north Antrim coast to consolidate their power and control, and Dunineny Castle was one of these.
The visible remains consist of meagre basalt walls, including two stumps of basalt masonry which may have been turrets on either side of what would have been the entrance. A moat or ditch separates the triangular platform on which the castle stood. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland provide a description of the ruins as they appeared in the 1830s, noting considerably more structure has since disappeared. No internal apartments or vestiges thereof are now discernible. Current repair work is being undertaken to prevent further deterioration of the remaining ruins. As a scheduled monument, a more detailed discussion can be found under reference SMR No. Ant 4:1 at the Monuments and Buildings Record in Belfast.
Local climate
Dunineny Castle Ruins, Clare Road, Ballycastle, Co Antrim sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,340 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 96% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 97% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 1 freeze-thaw cycle a year, fewer than 99% of listed buildings. Of these, 1 follows at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.2°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- No related consent applications matched
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- No flood data for this area
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
Matched applications, energy data and sale records are assembled automatically and may contain errors. Flag incorrect data.
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