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Archiver > DNA-R1B1C7 > 2007-07 > 1185196772


From: Terry Strasser <>
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] R1b1c7 in Scotland
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2007 06:19:32 -0700 (PDT)
In-Reply-To: <cbd.15d009e6.33d58043@aol.com>


John,

Would you have any information on the origins of the
Coyne/O'Cadhain family other than "a minor sept of
Partry?"

Terry
--- wrote:

>
> In a message dated 7/21/2007 3:17:56 P.M. Central
> Standard Time,
> writes:
>
> It wasn't the princes and future kings of Ireland
> who crossed and stayed, or
> at least, left their mark in the form of DNA. It
> was the younger sons who
> had no firm future in Ireland who would have
> crossed over. A number of Scots
> clans do claim descent from Ui Neill sons, and I
> believe one, the McLays of
> Bute, are proven to be so.
>
>
>
>
> This is where I disagree with your theory. The idea
> that younger sons had
> no firm future within a tribe in Ireland is a feudal
> idea. Not so in Ireland.
> The younger sons in royal dynasties of Ireland were
> all eligible for the
> kingship. So were their sons and grandsons. This
> is the old derbfine custom,
> which wasn't strictly followed. There were plenty
> of examples of intruders
> into the kingship from a given tribe that were
> technically outside of the
> boundaries established by derbfine.
> Of course as time progressed those in a given tribe
> eligible for the
> kingship would have been confined to smaller
> segments of the tribal population.
> But here we also have to remember that Irish
> territory was not feudal either -
> the land was owned by the tribe as a whole and
> distributed at regular
> intervals among the tribesmen. Ireland was
> extremely territorial. It had hundreds
> of chieftains elected from within the clan holding
> relatively small parcels
> of land; but there was no feudal inheritance by
> primogeniture, forcing
> dissatisfied younger sons to conquer new territory.
> These territories were also
> fiercely defended. Just imagine the reception a
> boatload of Scots sailing to
> Donegal looking for lands might have encountered
> from the local Irish
> chieftains. I'm sure the reverse was true in
> Scotland as well. Newcomers need not
> apply.
>
> This situation admittedly changed after the Norman
> invasion of Ireland.
> The succeeding centuries saw the importation of
> plenty of gallowglass Scots
> into Ireland, as mercenery soldiers to the Irish
> chieftains. There's a famous
> old poem about the hapless Ui Neill in Ireland
> trying to fend off the Normans
> in Ulster at the Battle of Downpatrick (1260 AD).
> The Irish are described
> as wearing flowing silk tunics with no armor at
> all; carrying spears into
> battle against the heavily armed Normans with their
> teams of archers. It was a
> slaughter, as one can imagine. And no accident
> that we suddenly find
> gallowglasses imported in Ireland a generation
> later.
>
> I don't think the ancient world was a free and open
> society, where anyone
> could travel where they wished at any time and
> settle where they pleased. It
> was very much territorial, ruled here by feudal
> barons, ruled there by
> Celtic chieftains. I doubt strangers were welcomed
> with open arms unless the
> local rulers saw something to gain from it.
>
> <A number of Scots clans do claim descent from Ui
> Neill sons, and I believe
> one, the McLays of Bute, are proven to be so.
>
> This goes back to the Anradan legend of the 1400s
> and later, and is not in
> the least proven. What they've done is deduce the
> name McLay from the
> personal name Dunsleive - and further deduce that
> this Dunsleive must be the
> Dunsleive who appears in the legends as a son of
> Anradan. Said Anradan is said to
> be a son of Aodh Athlaman, the King of Aileach in
> northern Ireland, who died
> in 1033 A.D. That's the supposed Ui Neill
> connection. There are any number
> of problems with this Ui Neill connection to
> Scotland, not the least of which
> is that the McLays are not mentioned in any of the
> pedigrees in Ireland or
> Scotland connecting them to the Anradan kindred,
> which consists of the
> MacSweeneys of ireland, the Maclachlans of Scotland,
> the MacEwens of Otter and the
> Lamonts of Scotland.
>
> What these families all have in common is an
> origin in Cowal and Knapdale
> in Argyllshire. When the MacSweeneys were settled
> as gallowglass under the
> O'Donnell chieftains of Tirconnell and given
> territorial status, most Irish
> historians believe they were given a faked Ui Neill
> pedigree to justify their
> newfound status as landholders in Donegal. The
> other families in Cowal and
> Knapdale probably just came along for the ride on
> the Anradan bandwagon.
>
> But it wasn't just the MacSweeneys who settled in
> Ireland as gallowglasses.
> The Lamonts did as well, described as Meg Buirche in
> the annals and in an
> O'Clery pedigree. The name Buirche comes from an
> Aodh Alainn an buirche in the
> Anradan pedigree. Interestingly an old pedigree
> in the Gaelic MS. of
> William Skene deduces the ancestry of the Lamonts
> from Anradan, son of
> Gilleibeirt, King of the western Isles in Scotland.
> From there the Lamont pedigree goes
> back to Nialgusa of Lochaber, the ancestor of the
> MacDonalds in Scotland,
> and further back to Colla Uais of the Irish
> Airgiallagh. Through all these
> records and pedigrees we see a line of complete
> fabrication, where in one place
> the MacDonald chieftains (who are really Norse) are
> linked to Colla Uais in
> Ireland; in another place, the Lamonts are linked
> to the same line of Colla
> Uais and the MacDonalds through a Dunsleive son of
> Anradan; in another place
> we see the same Anradan linked to Aodh Athlaman of
> the Ui Neill in Ireland.
> In one place we see Muirchertach MacEarca of the
> Irish Ui Neill said to be the
> founder of the Scottish Dal Riata; in another place
> it's just Erc, son of
> Eochaidh Muinremhar who was the ancestor of the Dal
> Riata. In yet another
> place we see a Reuda listed as the first of the Dal
> Riata to come to Scotland.
>
> These old legends are fun but I really think they
> should be tossed into
> the dustbin of history, along with King Milesius,
> Heber and Hermon and Fenius
> Farsaid of Scythia.
>
>
>
> John
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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