ancestry.com’s rootsweb references the very large number of historic castles of county kilkenny including kilcurl castle, that number being due to a history dating back to the time of the cambro-norman invasion in the late 12th century. they describe kilcurl castle as believed to have been built by treasa meith for the purcell family and known to have been forfeited by the purcells to oliver cromwell in the 1640s - when he confiscated most of the lands in knocktopher barony, as it was known at that time.