100 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



Co. Wexford, where also, as we liave seen (§ 14), his fellow-poets of the 

 MacEochadha family resided.' 



32. " Carrol Dale, of Pallice," Co. Wexford, 14 Nov., 1597 [no. 6160]. 

 Also " Carroyle boye \huidhe] Dalie," of some unspecified place in 

 Co. Wexford, 15 May, 1601 [no. 6517]. 



These particulars regarding Cearhliall (Buidhc) '0 Ddlaigli are of 

 importance in that they help to definitely fix in time and place a personality 

 who has hitherto been left to the mercy of oral tradition and its still more 

 unreliable commentators. According to the traditional anecdote (which was 

 first printed in Walker's " Historical Memoirs of the Irish Bards," 1786, app., 

 p. 60, as obtained from Cormac Common of Co. Mayo),- one Carrol O'Daly^ 

 was a suitor for the hand of a Miss Eleanor Kavanagh, but for one reason 

 or another her father arranged that she should marry another man. When the 

 wedding-party had assembled, Carrol entered, disguised as a harper, and played 

 and sang the song EibhUn a ruin'' (or otherwise secretly made himself known 

 to her), with the result that Eleanor immediately eloped with him. In 

 confirmation of the substantial truth of this legend, it can be shown that the 



1 This Aonghus and the Cearbhall of the next paragraph are the only O'Dalj's I have 

 noticed among the Fiants of the AVicklow- Wexford district. The O'Dalys, though 

 well established in perhaps the greater portion of Ireland, were evidently very few in 

 numbers in South-East Leinster. 



- Compare the versions, obtained in our own day, in '0 Mailles' "Amhrdin Chlainne 

 Gaedheal," pp. 192-3 (Galway), and in " An Lochrann," Sept., 1918, pp. 2-3 (Cork). In 

 both of these Cearbhall, in order to attract the attention of the lady (who is caUed 

 AiUneoir in the former, and the Rudaire Caomhanach' $ daughter in the latter version), 

 takes to shoemaking and, when an opportunity arises, makes a pair of "magic" shoes 

 for her. 



^ Common, as a Connachtman, not unnaturally confuses him with other O'Dalys 

 nearer home, but the date he suggests is more correct: "Carroll O'Daly (commonly 

 called jUac-caomh Insi Cneamha), brother to Donough Blore O'Daly, a man of much 

 consequence in Connaught about two centuries ago" (i.e. about 1586). Hai'diman 

 ("Irish Minstrelsy," i, 356-7) accepts this identification of Carrol as the brother of 

 " Donogh More," but, as the latter died in 1244, he naturally objects to the sixteenth- 

 century date as too late. O'Reilly (p. cxii) identifies the Carrol O'Daly of popular 

 tradition with the (Cearbhall '0 Dalaigh of Corcomroe (Co. Clare), whom the Annals 

 record as having died in 1404. So does W. H. G. Flood, so far as concerns Carrol the 

 lover of " Eileen Kavanagh " (sic). The words and music of Eibhlin a ruin were, he 

 affirms ("Story of the Harp," p. 62), "composed in 1386 by Carrol O'Daly, a famous 

 Irish harper " ; the date 1386 having apparently been arrived at by subtracting four 

 centuries instead of two from the date of publication of Walker's "Memoirs" ! 



* Common's version appears to be our only authority for the association of this air 

 with Cearbhall Dalaigh. It should be noted that the lady's name is everywhere (even 

 in Common's version) given as " Eleanor " [Eil'wnoir), not " Eileen " (Eibhlin). On the 

 other hand, we have contemporary evidence that Cearbhall was an expert musician ; see 

 the reference to P. Haiceud's poem, infra. But the connexion of Cearbhall with this 

 particular song and air of Eibhlin a riiin must, I fear, be regarded as quite unproven. 



