258 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



enrolling tribes (whom fortune had brought to the front after the tribal 

 pedigrees had crystallized), and so connected the groups to one tribal 

 ancestor. 1 



So laboriously has their history been collected and compiled by the 

 Rev. Canon O'Mahony that I feel I am freed from the necessity of following 

 their fortunes in any great detail. 2 A sketch, however, is necessary. The 

 tribe produced a notable churchman, St. Finnbarr (son of the chief metal- 

 worker of Tighernach, the chief of Eathleann), in about A D. 570, 3 whose 

 foundation of the see of Cork is proclaimed by the three tall white spires 

 rising out of the valley in which Cork city Lies. Tighernach his descent runs 

 through Aedh, Criomthann, and Eocho to Cass) was father of Fedlimid, who 

 was chief till 585. Pichan, King of Ui Echah in the Rabelaisian vision of 

 MacConglinne,' is possibly Bacc, grandson of the last ; a contemporary of 

 Cathal, son of Einguine, King of Munster a.d. 737. It must always be remem- 

 bered that no critical list of the Munster Kings has ever been prepared, and 

 the Dalcassian attempts to assert the mythical " alternate" succession with 

 theEoghanaehts have affected our earlysources, so that many records are biassed 

 by suppression, or perhaps refusal to recognize various chiefs as provincial 

 Kings. Therefore, if I fall in with my material, and call any chief " King 

 of Munster," it is only an allegation that some keeper of those records (and 

 presumably some tribes) regarded him as being such. Works like the " "Wars 

 of the Gaedhil," partizan pamphlets, and panegyrics, are as little to be 

 received as decisive as the statements in the Lives of certain saints, making 

 the holy man's father a king, or even a provincial king, instead of an obscure 

 chief, or even landowner. 



Donall, son of Cathal, was King of the Ui Eacach, fought the Xorse, and 



1 The claims of the Dalgcais to equal succession and position with the Eoghanachts, 

 and the slow and unwilling acceptance of these fictions by their rivals, deserve special 

 study. 



- See Cork Historical and Archaeological Journal, vol. xii, p. 182. I am greatly 

 indebted to the work of Canon John Mahony, of Crookstown, though I had myself 

 amassed the Records of the Dublin offices when commencing special work for my survey 

 of the coasts of the three southern provinces in 1906. Rarely has such a mass of materials 

 been brought together so available for workers on tribal history as in his papers. Ibid., 

 vols, xii-xv. 



3 Life of St. Barr (Bodleian siss., Rawlinson, No. 485, of the fifteenth century). Barr, 

 son of Amargenus, Smith to the Prince of Raithluyn. Tyagnacus, descended from Cass, 

 son of Exhach [sicj. 



1 " Aislinge Meic Conglinne, The Vision of Mac Conglinne " (ed. Kuno Meyer), 1892, 

 fro^a the Leabhar Breac. For Pichan, son of Maelfind, King of Iveagh, see p. 42, sqq. 

 In so fanciful a tale it is possible that the name is a pure invention, and not intended for 

 Bacc. 



