Froinsias Ó Maolmhuaidh (anglicised asFrancis Molloy; c. 1606–1677) was aFranciscanfriar,theologian andgrammarian, author of the first published grammar of theIrish language written inLatin.
Ó Maolmhuaidh was born in theDiocese of Meath, most probably in the district ofFercall, lordship of TheÓ Maolmhuaidh, in what was then calledKing's County. While his exact place within the Ó Maolmhuaidh family is unknown, he recorded stories heard in his youth "of a greatChristmas banquet for 960 people, lasting twelve days, held by Calvagh O'Molloy,chief of his name, at the end of the sixteenth century."[1]
He appears to have been an uncle to Reverend Seán Ó Dálaigh, a student atSaint Isidore's College,Rome, who seemed to have been the man who acted ascensor librorum for Ó Maolmhuaidh'sGrammatica.
Ó Maolmhuaidh became a member of theFriars Minor of Strict Observance at the Irish College at Rome on 2 August 1632. In 1642 he was appointedlecturer inphilosophy at Klosterneuberg,Vienna, when aged about thirty-six. It was then that his solelytheological work,Disputatio theologica de incarnatione verbi ad mentemJoannis Duns Scoti was written, probably as athesis. It was published in 1645. He received instructions while inMantua, on 4 May 1647, to proceed to the Irish Franciscan College of St. Isidore, at Rome, to teach philosophy; he was teachingtheology there in 1652, and was doing so as late as 1677. While he never seems to have becomeguardian of the college on the death ofLuke Wadding in 1657, he was president for a time in 1671.
Ó Maolmhuaidh was still in Rome when hisIubilatio genethliaca in honorem Prosperi Baltharasaris Philippi Hispaniarum principis was published there in 1658. "By 1663 he was preparing a course on philosophy for publication. The first part of hisPhilosophia ... tomus primus dialectiae breviarum complectens was published at Rome in 1666, but no further part was published."[1]
His best-known work,Lucerna fidelium, seu, Fasciclus decerptus ab authoribus magis versatis qui tractarunt de doctrin a Christiana (Lochrann na gCreidmheach), was an Irish-languagecatechism of Catholic churchdoctrine. It was published in Rome in 1676. This project dated back to 1670, when it was instigated by the secretary ofCongregatio de Propaganda Fide, MonsignorBaldeschi, who, along with Cardinal Altieri (laterPope Clement X), were among his most influential friends and contacts in the city.
His last printed work,Grammatica Latino-Hibernica nunc compendiata, was the first printedgrammar of the Irish language, and was published in 1677. It is inLatin, and consists of twenty-five chapters: nine on the letters of thealphabet, three onetymology, one oncontractions andcryptic writings, and twelve onprosody andversification. At the end is an Irish poem by Molloy on the neglect of the ancient language of Ireland and the prospects of its resuscitation.[2]
He attended ageneral chapter of the order at Rome in 1664 on behalf of the Irishprovincial superior.
He had been working on behalf of his fellow Irish Franciscans for a number of years and was respected by them. In May 1670 he was appointed procurator of the Irish Franciscan province at the Romancuria. In 1671 he was recommended to the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide for appointment asbishop of Kildare, with Signora Maria Altieri, sister of Pope Clement X, among his supporters. The opposition ofOliver Plunkett,archbishop of Armagh, may have been enough to ensure he was not appointed, and he did not return to Ireland, though he had intended to do so toward the end of his life.[1]
While a commemorative stone at St. Isidore's College erected early in the 1900s gave 1684 as the year of his death, Ó Maolmhuaidh's decease has since been narrowed to sometime in the last quarter of 1677. He died while travelling throughFrance forIreland, in the company ofSeán Ó Dálaigh.[1]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Gilbert, John Thomas (1894). "Molloy, Francis". InLee, Sidney (ed.).Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 38. London: Smith, Elder & Co.