Myrtle Grove, Youghal
{{short description|Residential building in Youghal}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2021}}
{{Use Irish English|date=June 2021}}
Myrtle Grove is an Elizabethan gabled house in Youghal, County Cork, Ireland. The house is notable as a rare example in Ireland of a 16th-century unfortified house. It is situated close to the Collegiate Church of St Mary Youghal.{{cite book|title=A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland|page=728|first=Samuel|last=Lewis|date=1837|volume=II}}
History
File:Sir Walter Raleigh, cottage at Youghal (36346495935).jpg
It was home for Sir Walter Raleigh from 1588 to 1589. Myrtle Grove's South Gable is where Edmund Spenser is reputed to have written part of his poem The Faerie Queene, although some historians question this story.{{cite journal|url = http://www.historyireland.com/volume-22/good-heritage-tourism-story-getting-way-historical-facts/ | title = A good heritage/ tourism story getting in the way of historical facts? | journal = History Ireland | date = 2014 | volume = 22| issue = 1 | author = Michael Twomey }} The house was acquired by Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork in 1602 from Sir Walter Raleigh's Irish estate. Boyle leased it to his protege Sir Lawrence Parsons, the judge of the Irish Admiralty Court. Though remodelled twice it remains one of the best-known examples of a Tudor house in Ireland.{{cite web|url = http://archiseek.com/2010/raleigh-house-youghal-co-cork/ | author = Archiseek | work = Architecture of Cork | title = 1550s – Myrtle Grove, Youghal, Co. Cork | date = 2010 | accessdate = 3 August 2017 }} The house was acquired by the Hayman family in the 18th century.{{cite book|author = Mark Bence-Jones| title= A Guide to Irish Country Houses| place = London| date = 1988 | isbn = 9780094699908 }}{{cite book|author = J.B. Burke| title = A Visitation of the Seats and Arms of the Noblemen and Gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland | series = 2nd Series| volume = II| date = 1855| page = [https://archive.org/details/visitationofseat185402burk/page/66 66]|url= https://archive.org/details/visitationofseat185402burk }}
In the 20th century, it was the home of Sir Henry Arthur Blake and Lady Blake. At this time, the building housed "the best collection of West Indian paintings and sketches".{{cite journal|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=flE8AQAAIAAJ | journal=The Academy and Literature|volume=65|title=Art Notes|year=1904|page=595|editor=William Teignmouth Shore}} The Blakes lived here until their deaths. They were buried in the garden.{{cite web|url = https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/the-girl-in-the-painting-2303618.html | work = The Independent | author = Patrick Cockburn| title = The girl in the painting | date = 27 June 2011 }}
The house remains in private ownership and is closed to the public.
Legends
The house is reputed to be where potatoes were first planted in Ireland or in Europe.{{cite web|url = http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=record&county=CO®no=20823028 | publisher =National Inventory of Architectural Heritage | work = Buildings of Ireland | title = Myrtle Grove, Church Street, Youghal, County Cork | accessdate = 3 August 2017 }} The latter is unlikely, however, as potatoes were present only in Spain in 1536. There is a similar legend stating that Myrtle Grove was where tobacco was first smoked by Walter Raleigh.
"Myrtle Grove", a poem written in Spenserian stanzas by James Reiss, and published in Fugue magazine (the University of Idaho) in 2007, develops the legend that Edmund Spenser wrote portions of his great epic, The Faerie Queene, under an aureole window in the South Gable of Raleigh's house.{{cite journal | journal = Fugue | title = Myrtle Grove | date = 2007 | volume = Summer/fall 2007 |pages= 22–24}}
References
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{{Sir Walter Raleigh|state=collapsed}}
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