What are the best castles and heritage sites in County Kildare?
Maynooth Castle is the heavyweight: a Fitzgerald stronghold from the 1200s at the gates of the university, free to visit in season, its keep and gatehouse much of what siege guns and centuries left standing. Castletown House at Celbridge is the grand house rather than a castle, Ireland's largest Palladian mansion, built in the 1720s for William Conolly. The older Kildare is monastic: the high crosses and round tower at Castledermot, the great cross at Moone, and St Brigid's Cathedral and round tower in Kildare town itself. Kilkea Castle near Castledermot flies the Fitzgerald flag as a hotel, and Donadea has its ruined castle in the forest park, home to the Aylmer family for nearly four centuries.
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