On the trail of Roesia de Verdun: Ireland’s only female castle builder

Revealing Roesia: Medieval archaeologist Dr Karen Dempsey at Castleroche in Co Louth where she is looking for traces of Roesia de Verdun, the only woman to have built a castle in Ireland in the 13th century.

It feels like glorious serendipity that a project aimed at revealing more about the only woman known to have built a castle in Ireland is taking place during National Heritage Week.

I’m a huge fan of castles and, in particular, of castlebuilder Roesia de Verdun, or Rose of the Rock as she is known locally. The 13th-century noblewoman built an impressive fortress on a rocky outcrop in Castleroche, Co Louth, and then supposedly pushed the master mason out of the window so that he wouldn’t replicate the building’s design.

To this day, one of the castle’s windows is known as the “murder hole”.

Once ensconced in palatial splendour, the formidable Roesia went about her business as a no-nonsense châtelaine, managing her estate and riding out on horseback, in full armour, to keep her Gaelic enemies at bay. Or so the local legend tells us.

As female villains go, here is one unscrupulous and brave enough to head up an entire TV series.

But perhaps it’s time to commission a different kind of series; one that charts the progress of ‘Revealing Roesia’ (pronounced Ro-he-sha), the archaeological survey that is taking place in the castle’s grounds this week.

For a promotional blurb, look no further than a tweet by medieval archaeologist Dr Karen Dempsey who asks: “What lies beneath? Can we identify the deserted medieval village, historically attested fairground or even a garden?”

Answer: It’s entirely possible.

First day of survey at Castleroche. Our @RIAdawson @SocMedArch funded project to reveal (through geophys) more of the castle created by Roesia de Verdun c1236. What lies beneath? Can we identify the deserted medieval village, historically attested fairground or even a garden? pic.twitter.com/FDtVK6dSOS

— Karen Dempsey (@karrycrow) August 11, 2021

Although geophysical analysis – which collects data without disturbing the ground as any Time Team fan knows only too well – is still ongoing, she and fellow archaeologists Laura Corrway and Dr Susan Curran believe there are other buildings.

“What we do know,” she adds, “is that further research is needed. Revealing the castle and landscape of Roesia de Verdun – the only historically documented woman castle-builder in 13th-century Ireland – is important.”

What is also really important is putting women back into those castles. “Women are typically absent within castle studies, and where present, they are often portrayed as secluded and passive agents,” says Karen Dempsey, who has the enviable job title of ‘Castellologist’.

She uses the term playfully – “many things to do with archaeology end in ‘ology’ and it’s better than castle studies expert” – but her study of castles and her desire to take medieval women out of the shadows is deadly serious.

When playing Citadels with her nephews, she was horrified to see so few women featured in the loosely medieval strategic card game. Worse than that, she found that when people thought of medieval women, they imagined them sequestered away in the tower, helpless and passive.

That is why Roesia stands out. Her legend might give us a meaty yarn, but there is a very real woman behind it. Even in her own time, Roesia de Verdun (c.1204-1247) was considered exceptional. When she built Castleroche around 1236, it was noted that she had done something “which none of her ancestors was able to do”.

And she did much more besides. Pick through the historical references and you’ll find that she rented land, took her adversaries to court – the Abbot of Mellifont among them – and settled a long-running dispute with Hugh de Lacy, Earl of Ulster, in 1235.

She also kept her own name when she married Theobald Butler in 1225 so that she might pass on her considerable wealth to her own five children, who were born in the five years that followed. (Her husband had others by a previous marriage).

When Theobald died in battle in 1230, she paid the King, Henry lll, a large sum of money to be allowed to remain single. As a femme sole, or unmarried woman, she had the right to own property and sign contracts in her own name.

On an aside, noblewomen tended to have their children one after the other while, as Dr Gillian Kenny, historian of women, has found, peasant women had a child every other year. She speculates that is because the upper classes gave their children to wet nurses but ordinary women breastfed them, which helped to space out their pregnancies.

Speaking of which, back at Castleroche there is fascinating evidence to suggest that Roesia or her household deliberately cultivated milk thistle, a plant known to help the production of breastmilk. It was one of a number of relict plants (or non-native plants) identified by Dr Dempsey and botanist Dr Fiona MacGowan in a 2020 study funded by the Castle Studies Trust.

They found an unusually high number of non-native plants, which were possibly introduced by the Normans. Hemlock was among them, the poison associated in the popular imagination with the demise of Socrates. In medieval times, however, it was used medicinally to treat a range of ailments from bladder complaints to soothing herpes and easing joint pain.

The discovery of plants in the castle grounds suggests they were deliberately cultivated and raises the important issue of preserving our ‘green heritage’. Is it wise, for instance, to intensively manage the gardens at our national heritage sites if a study of their original plants can potentially reveal so much?

“At Castleroche,” Karen Dempsey continues, “we might never know whether or not this [garden] was used by Lady Roesia and her household, but the important point is that by creating a clearer picture of Castleroche and its landscapes we can attend to the daily lives and concerns of some medieval people,” says Karen Dempsey.

This week’s survey is funded by the Royal Irish Academy and the Society for Medieval Archaeology. Louth Archaeological and Historical Society is also a partner, a timely reminder of the role played by local communities and landowners in identifying and safeguarding Ireland’s rich heritage.

To see the depth of that nationwide interest, check out the 700-plus projects on the National Heritage Week website. Scrolling through the events is like rifling through a bag of assorted sweets. It is impossible to pick just one or, indeed, to stop going back for more.

It’s heartening, too, to see that local groups in Louth and elsewhere are starting to look at the past and ask different questions. For too long, we have told the stories of men but not even all men; only the ones that wrote themselves into the surviving documents with their military, economic or political achievements.

That is starting to change as historians and archaeologists seek out the stories of women, in all their glory, and ordinary people who have so much to tell us. ‘History from-below’, instead of a top-down approach, opens up the possibility of understanding so much more about those who passed this way before us.

‘Revealing Roesia’ is already offering glimpses of the castle built by a powerful Norman woman but it also has the potential to shine a light on the people who attended the weekly market and the annual fair which had been established in Castleroche by 1284.

If nothing else, it will take medieval woman off the sidelines and put them, alongside men, back at the centre of the action.