Irish History
And
The Fighting Irish
And
The Fighting Irish
( Ireland and the Viking Invasion )
Some
of these women settled down with their husbands in Ireland. Others followed them to Norway
or Iceland, and many other Irish women, even of the highest class of society were carried away as slaves. Thus inter-marriage and the adoption of Christianity by the majority of the Norsemen, were strong helps towards the assimilation of the invader.
Another help was the custom of fosterage, in vogue among both peoples, according to which Irish children were sometimes adopted even into families of their country's enemies. Some of these children, who had been adopted at the most impressionable age, forsook the nationality and religion of their parents and embraced that of their fosterers. These apostate Irish, together with companies of mixed Irish, and foreigners abd Gaelic speaking Norsemen from the Hebrides and other western islands, became bandits, scoured the country and plundered the Irish and Norse indiscriminately. The Chronicles call them " Gaill-Gaedhel ", " the foreign Irish " but the people knew them as " the sons of death " because of their ferociousness. They were especially numerous and active about the middle of the ninth century and their most conspicuous leader was Caitill Finn, " Ketil the White " a man of Norse descent. Finall the Irish Chieftains and the Norwegian Kings of Dublin joined forces to destroy them and in the year 857, Ketil was killed by King Amhlaobh of Dublin, who commanded a troop of independent Norsemen in the south of Ireland.
As in some other countries, France for example, up to the ninth century, the warrior church-man was a conspicuous figure in Ireland in the ninth-tenth centuries. The most celebrated of all the priest-warriors was the
Abbot-Archbishop Cormac mac Cuilennain, who reigned as King of Munster from 901 to 908. He was also an accomplished scribe and scholar. Besides his native Gaelic he knew Latin, Welsh, Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse and some Greek and Hebrew, and he compiled the Psalter of Cashel and the ' Sanas Cormaic ' " Cormac's Glossary " the very first comparative vernacular dictionary in any language in modern Europe. In the words of an old annalist
" he was the most learned of all who came or shall come of the men of Erin forever. " Cormac was a man of peace and would, no doubt, have preferred to devote himself to the quiet pursuits of the student, but unfortunately for himself, he followed the advice of his turbulent and warlike counsellor, Flaithbhertach ( Flaherty ), Abbot of Scattery island in the Shannon, who instigated the king to go to war with the men of Leinster. Apitched battle was fought in the year 908 at Belach Mugna ( Ballaghmoon ) in Kildare, a couple of miles north of Carlow. It was a hopeless attack for the men of Munster and ended in their complete rout and destruction. Clergy and laity were slaughtered without distinction. Cormac himself was thrown from his horse which slipped on the blood soaked ground and his neck broken. The enemy thrust spears into his body and cut off his head. And thus in the words of the Four Masters, fell " the bishop, the father confessor, the renowned illustrious doctor, King of Cashel, King of Iarmumha; O God! Alas for Cormac! "
A son of the romantic Gormlaith - who had been betrothed to Cormac before he became a religious - was Muirchertach ( Murtogh, which is very close to the spelling of my own surname of Murtagh ) a soldier of the first rank and heir to the throne of Ireland. He seems to have sworn to avenge his father's death, and from 918 to 943 he carried on the war victoriously against the Danes of Dublin and attacked their overseas settlements in the Hebrides and on the north coast of Scotland. In the depth of the winter of 941, when he was least expected by his enemies, he made a hostage levying circuit of Ireland at the head of a thousand picked men whom he had clad in leather cloaks, whence he is known as " Muirchertach of the Leather Cloaks. " He too, was finally defeated by the foreigners. During the first half of the tenth century the Danes gained possession of large parts of the interior of the country. In 914 strong reinforcements arrived at Waterford. They again sailed up the Shannon in a great fleet and into Lough Ree where they plundered the islands and burned Clonmacnois. Their leader this time was Tomrair, King, or son, of the King of Denmark, who in the words of the annalist, under the year 922, is reported to have gone " to hell with his pains, as he deserved. " By the middle of the century, however, fortune again turned in favour of the Irish. They had learned how to build warships and to employ naval tactics after the manner of the Northmen. The most celebrated of the naval battles in which they engaged is connected with the name of Cellachan of Cashel, who began to reign in 934 and who won back Cashel and most of Munster from the Danes. He was afterwards taken prisoner but was resued in the course of the famous sea fight, which took place in 950-951 in the Bay of Dundalk, the foreigners being under the command of Sitric, who was drowned in the Battle. After the fight, Cellachan entered Dublin, collected great stores of cattle, gold, silver and other treasures, burned the town and departed.
Another help was the custom of fosterage, in vogue among both peoples, according to which Irish children were sometimes adopted even into families of their country's enemies. Some of these children, who had been adopted at the most impressionable age, forsook the nationality and religion of their parents and embraced that of their fosterers. These apostate Irish, together with companies of mixed Irish, and foreigners abd Gaelic speaking Norsemen from the Hebrides and other western islands, became bandits, scoured the country and plundered the Irish and Norse indiscriminately. The Chronicles call them " Gaill-Gaedhel ", " the foreign Irish " but the people knew them as " the sons of death " because of their ferociousness. They were especially numerous and active about the middle of the ninth century and their most conspicuous leader was Caitill Finn, " Ketil the White " a man of Norse descent. Finall the Irish Chieftains and the Norwegian Kings of Dublin joined forces to destroy them and in the year 857, Ketil was killed by King Amhlaobh of Dublin, who commanded a troop of independent Norsemen in the south of Ireland.
As in some other countries, France for example, up to the ninth century, the warrior church-man was a conspicuous figure in Ireland in the ninth-tenth centuries. The most celebrated of all the priest-warriors was the
Abbot-Archbishop Cormac mac Cuilennain, who reigned as King of Munster from 901 to 908. He was also an accomplished scribe and scholar. Besides his native Gaelic he knew Latin, Welsh, Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse and some Greek and Hebrew, and he compiled the Psalter of Cashel and the ' Sanas Cormaic ' " Cormac's Glossary " the very first comparative vernacular dictionary in any language in modern Europe. In the words of an old annalist
" he was the most learned of all who came or shall come of the men of Erin forever. " Cormac was a man of peace and would, no doubt, have preferred to devote himself to the quiet pursuits of the student, but unfortunately for himself, he followed the advice of his turbulent and warlike counsellor, Flaithbhertach ( Flaherty ), Abbot of Scattery island in the Shannon, who instigated the king to go to war with the men of Leinster. Apitched battle was fought in the year 908 at Belach Mugna ( Ballaghmoon ) in Kildare, a couple of miles north of Carlow. It was a hopeless attack for the men of Munster and ended in their complete rout and destruction. Clergy and laity were slaughtered without distinction. Cormac himself was thrown from his horse which slipped on the blood soaked ground and his neck broken. The enemy thrust spears into his body and cut off his head. And thus in the words of the Four Masters, fell " the bishop, the father confessor, the renowned illustrious doctor, King of Cashel, King of Iarmumha; O God! Alas for Cormac! "
A son of the romantic Gormlaith - who had been betrothed to Cormac before he became a religious - was Muirchertach ( Murtogh, which is very close to the spelling of my own surname of Murtagh ) a soldier of the first rank and heir to the throne of Ireland. He seems to have sworn to avenge his father's death, and from 918 to 943 he carried on the war victoriously against the Danes of Dublin and attacked their overseas settlements in the Hebrides and on the north coast of Scotland. In the depth of the winter of 941, when he was least expected by his enemies, he made a hostage levying circuit of Ireland at the head of a thousand picked men whom he had clad in leather cloaks, whence he is known as " Muirchertach of the Leather Cloaks. " He too, was finally defeated by the foreigners. During the first half of the tenth century the Danes gained possession of large parts of the interior of the country. In 914 strong reinforcements arrived at Waterford. They again sailed up the Shannon in a great fleet and into Lough Ree where they plundered the islands and burned Clonmacnois. Their leader this time was Tomrair, King, or son, of the King of Denmark, who in the words of the annalist, under the year 922, is reported to have gone " to hell with his pains, as he deserved. " By the middle of the century, however, fortune again turned in favour of the Irish. They had learned how to build warships and to employ naval tactics after the manner of the Northmen. The most celebrated of the naval battles in which they engaged is connected with the name of Cellachan of Cashel, who began to reign in 934 and who won back Cashel and most of Munster from the Danes. He was afterwards taken prisoner but was resued in the course of the famous sea fight, which took place in 950-951 in the Bay of Dundalk, the foreigners being under the command of Sitric, who was drowned in the Battle. After the fight, Cellachan entered Dublin, collected great stores of cattle, gold, silver and other treasures, burned the town and departed.
The
most famous hero of the Danish period in Ireland and one of the most famous in all Irish history was
the celebrated Brian mac Cenneidigh, son of Kennedy, Chief of Thomond, including the eastern portion of the present county of Clare, and herediatary ruler of North Munster. He was born probably in the year 941 and is known in history as Brian Boru, which he took from the name of the town of Borime, near Killaloe, on the right bank of the Shannon. He was the youngest of 12 brothers, all of whom fell in battle, except Marcan, who was a religious and head of the clergy of Munster, and Anluan who died of severe illness.
Brian's eldest brother was Mathghamhain ( Mahon ) who succeeded his father, and in 968 became King of Munster. Mahon was engaged almost constantly in war with the Danes and with the Leinstermen who, as a rule, were in alliance with them, " for there were many Gael who stood by him ( Sitric of Limerick ) not so much through love of him as through hatred of the Dal Cais ( the Dalcassians, the family to which Kennedy belonged ) " In 959 Mahon and the Munstermen plundered Clonmacnois. In 965 they destroyed Limerick, and in 968 they fought a decisive battle with the Irish-Norse at Sulchoid about two and a half miles northwest of Tipperary. The battle lasted from sunrise till midday and ended in the complete rout of the allies. The prisoners were then collected on the hill of Saingel near Limerick, and " every one that was fit for war was put to death and every one that was fit for a slave was enslaved. " In 976 Mahon was betrayed, some say by an Irish prince, and treacherously put to death by his Norse and Irish enemies. Brian then thirty-five years of age, became King of Munster and took quick vengeance on
the assassins. In three years' time he was the undisputed King of the southern half of Ireland.
In 980 Maelsechlainn ( Malachy ) II, surnamed Mor, " the Great " king of Meath, became emperor of Ireland, and in the same year he won a victory over the Danes at the Battle of Tara. Somewhere about that time Brian became the bitter rival of Malachy and made up his mind to dispute the throne with him. In 985, with a great fleet, he saild up the Shannon to Lough Ree, raided Meath, and did great damage to Connacht. For a few years there was a show of friendship between the two kings, and in 998, they came to an understanding, and made a truce according to which, on certain conditions Malachy was limited as sole sovereign of the northern, and Brian, of the southern half of Ireland. Thereupon the Leinstermen allied themselves with the Dublin Danes and revolted. Brian and Malachy united their forces " to the great joy of the Irish " as the Four Masters say, and in 999 defeated them " with red slaughter " at Glenmama near Dunlavin, County Wicklow. Seven thousand Danes are said to have fallen in the battle. The Irish then marched to Dublin which they sacked of its accumilated treasures, ravaged Leinster and expelled King Sitric, with whom Brian himself was afterwards to make peace and an alliance.
The two Irish Kings soon quarrelled again and in the year 1002, Malachy, finding that there was defection in his ranks was compelled to resign his supremacy to the superior force of Brian and step down to the position of a provincial King. The fact is Brian violated the treaty.
Brian's eldest brother was Mathghamhain ( Mahon ) who succeeded his father, and in 968 became King of Munster. Mahon was engaged almost constantly in war with the Danes and with the Leinstermen who, as a rule, were in alliance with them, " for there were many Gael who stood by him ( Sitric of Limerick ) not so much through love of him as through hatred of the Dal Cais ( the Dalcassians, the family to which Kennedy belonged ) " In 959 Mahon and the Munstermen plundered Clonmacnois. In 965 they destroyed Limerick, and in 968 they fought a decisive battle with the Irish-Norse at Sulchoid about two and a half miles northwest of Tipperary. The battle lasted from sunrise till midday and ended in the complete rout of the allies. The prisoners were then collected on the hill of Saingel near Limerick, and " every one that was fit for war was put to death and every one that was fit for a slave was enslaved. " In 976 Mahon was betrayed, some say by an Irish prince, and treacherously put to death by his Norse and Irish enemies. Brian then thirty-five years of age, became King of Munster and took quick vengeance on
the assassins. In three years' time he was the undisputed King of the southern half of Ireland.
In 980 Maelsechlainn ( Malachy ) II, surnamed Mor, " the Great " king of Meath, became emperor of Ireland, and in the same year he won a victory over the Danes at the Battle of Tara. Somewhere about that time Brian became the bitter rival of Malachy and made up his mind to dispute the throne with him. In 985, with a great fleet, he saild up the Shannon to Lough Ree, raided Meath, and did great damage to Connacht. For a few years there was a show of friendship between the two kings, and in 998, they came to an understanding, and made a truce according to which, on certain conditions Malachy was limited as sole sovereign of the northern, and Brian, of the southern half of Ireland. Thereupon the Leinstermen allied themselves with the Dublin Danes and revolted. Brian and Malachy united their forces " to the great joy of the Irish " as the Four Masters say, and in 999 defeated them " with red slaughter " at Glenmama near Dunlavin, County Wicklow. Seven thousand Danes are said to have fallen in the battle. The Irish then marched to Dublin which they sacked of its accumilated treasures, ravaged Leinster and expelled King Sitric, with whom Brian himself was afterwards to make peace and an alliance.
The two Irish Kings soon quarrelled again and in the year 1002, Malachy, finding that there was defection in his ranks was compelled to resign his supremacy to the superior force of Brian and step down to the position of a provincial King. The fact is Brian violated the treaty.
BRIAN BORU
