118 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



demanded a dagger from his uncle Caier, was refused, and bitterly satirized 

 the chief. Caier, disfigured by the rhyme, fled to Cacher mac nEiderscele 

 in Dun Cermnai for shelter, concealing his name and rank. Later on Nede, 

 who had taken the greyhound, chariot, and wife of his victim, drove up to the 

 gate, and Caier indignantly betrayed his identity and fled. Concealing 

 himself (presumably in a souterrain) under a flagstone, behind the Dun, 1 

 he was found by the dogs ; Nede appeared, and his enemy fell dead of shame, 

 but not unavenged — the rock burst into flame and exploded, and a splinter 

 struck the satirist through the eye, piercing his brain. This story seems 

 to imply that the fort was occupied by a member of the Corealaidhe, among 

 whom the name Eidersceol prevailed, and gave their descendants the name 

 of liEidersceoil or O'Driscoll. A poem of Corinae mac Cuillenan {ante 908), 

 cited by Keating, 2 tells how, about 370, Criomthann, king of Erin, and his 

 foster-son Connall Eachluath, king of Thomond, held Dun Cearmna among 

 other forts in Munster. 



It is a fair deduction that it, like Kinsale, was held by the Norsemen, 

 for its name, down to the close of the thirteenth century, was Olderness 

 or Oldernaze, which survives in an English form. As the Xorse held 

 Limerick, 812, and Cork in 820, it is possible tbat the names of 

 Olderness, Edelfiord or Kinsale 8 Harbour, Oyster Haven, Osterhafn, 4 and 

 Godelfiord date from the early ninth century. The actual history of the 

 castle is far later, and begins under the De Courceys. It is the hard 

 fortune of antiquaries to " spoil a good story," and modern research entirely 

 discredits the descent of that family 5 from John de Courcey, the devastator 

 of Ulster, and the story of his imprisonment being ended because he alone 

 could face an insolent French knight who tied at the mere sight of him. 6 

 Late story ran that the injured nobleman refused compensation save the 



1 These words clearly suggest the long fortified headland. 

 - Vol. i. p. 148. 



3 Edelfiord is a quasi- translation of the Irish ; Edel, Cecum, head or inner end ; fiord, 

 anile, salt water creek. In the portolan maps it is Adelfronda in 1339 ; Adelforda, 1360 

 and 1497 : Adelfrud, 1 367 ; and Andelfronda, 1375. It is Endelford in the Patent Rolls 

 It., 1395, and Kinsale de d Endilvorth on the old town seal. 



4 I owe this suggestion to Mr. James Mills, the Deputy Keeper of the Records ; if so, 

 then Kinsale was the western haven. 



5 The old genealogists spent their time in inventing flimsy reasons to condone the 

 wild statements of the pedigree, rather than in clearing away the debris. See generally 

 " Lodge's Peerage " (ed. Archdall), vol. vi, p. 132, and the critical notes of G. E. C. in 

 the Complete Peerage, vol. iv, and appendix, vol. v, p. 392, vol. viii, p. 435 ; also paper 

 by J. Horace Round in " Antiquarian Magazine," vols, iii, and iv, and his "Peerage and 

 Pedigree," vol. ii, p. 274. 



" Book of Howth," Cal. Carew Papers. 



