Birr Castle Demesne

Birr Castle Demesne has been the Parsons family home for more than four hundred years. Its Great Telescope, built in 1845 and known as the Leviathan, was the largest in the world for over seventy years, and Ireland’s Historic Science Centre beside it holds early photographic, astronomical and engineering equipment. The gardens carry plants collected by the Earls of Rosse over the past hundred and fifty years. Open daily; times change through the year.