282 



Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academi/. 



of Cunacanos. For I have found no instance of qu and c being con- 

 founded in any Ogam of respectable antiquity. The reading would in 

 that case be Cunalegi ave Qunacanos, meaning Cunalegis nepos Cuna- 

 canus. 



Further, there are difficulties attaching to the identification of the 

 proper names. Cunalegi would probably be in later Irish Conlig or 

 Condlig^ of which the genitive seems to have been Conlega : the Annals 

 of Ulster have, under the year 1387, a certain Matha mac Conlega. 



As to Qunacan-os, this should be in later Iiish possibly Conacdn, 

 genitive Conacmia, and the former occurs, written, however, Connacan, 

 and borne by a certain Connacan mac Colmain : see Stokes's " Patrick," 

 pp. 174, 5, and the Introduction, p. Ixiij, where the editor identifies 

 this Connacan with a man killed in Ulster in the year 853. This is 

 borne out by the " Chronicon Scotorum," which calls him Connecan 

 mac CoLmain (a.d. 855) as do also the "Four Masters" and the 

 "Annals of Ulster" (a.d. 854). The "Four Masters" spell this 

 man's name Conneccan, but under the year 910 they mention another 

 man of the name, which this time they write Connican. Thus we 

 have the variants Connacan, Connecan, Conneccan, Connican, all with 

 mi, which is probably more correct than the n of the Ogmic form ; 

 and supposing this to prove well-founded, one would seem to be 

 warranted in regarding Connacan as a diminutive of the name Conn. 

 Lastly, there is a very serious difference of declension between Qima- 

 canos and Connacan, namely, that in later Irish the diminutives in 

 -can make their genitives in -cain, for an earlier -can-i or cagn-i, and 

 not in -can-a, for an earlier -can-os. But one may, perhaps, regai'd this 

 as an instance of the encroachment of the genitive in ^ of the f avouiite 

 declension, and here it may have involved the confusion of -an with 

 an ; but I must confess that I am not satisfied with this conjectui'e, 

 which is only meant to stand till a better one has been suggested. 



