The fifth in a series of bi-annual lectures delivered at Barryscourt Castle in Co Cork. Barryscourt Castle is a tower-house with a bawn (an enclosed yard). The tower-house is particularly large, and the bawn is well protected by corner towers.

Two versions of a bawn have emerged at Barryscourt. The earlier was irregular in shape and enclosed by a moat; the later is the bawn we see today, almost square and enclosed by a stone wall with a tower at each corner.

The remains of buildings and open spaces in the earlier bawn are fragmentary, damaged by the rearrangement and by the later use of the walled enclosure as a vegetable garden and farmyard, but the remains in the walled bawn have fared better.

In this book, Dave Pollock describes the excavation of the bawn at Barryscourt, supporting his essay with particularly informative drawings and photographs.