Rathfriland

Rathfriland stands on a prominent hill in County Down, within the former Magennis lordship of Iveagh. By the sixteenth century the family used it as their base, with nearby Knock Iveagh serving as an inauguration place. The wars of the seventeenth century broke their territorial power. Arthur Magennis, the third viscount, inherited a large but indebted estate; in 1642 he unsuccessfully opposed Robert Monro's advancing Covenanter army and lost control of Iveagh. Cromwellian confiscation deprived him of his lands, and restoration of the monarchy did not restore his former position. Rathfriland's later history is visible in the market town that developed around its central square. The surviving market house dates from the later eighteenth century and appears on a town plan of 1776. It combined commerce with local justice: an 1834 Ordnance Survey account described a monthly manor court there. In 1798 a meeting in the building had called for troops amid unrest in the district.