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Genealogy was cultivated since at least the start of the early Irish historic era. Uponinauguration,Bards and poets are believed to have recited the ancestry of an inaugurated king to emphasize hishereditary right to rule. With the transition to written culture, oral history was preserved in the monastic settlements.Dáibhí Ó Cróinín believed thatGaelic genealogies came to be written down with or soon after the practice of annalistic records, annals being kept by monks to determine the yearlychronology offeast days (seeIrish annals).[citation needed]
Genealogy had at first served a purely serious purpose in determining the legal rights of related individuals to land and goods. UnderFenechas, ownership of land was determined byAgnatic succession, female ownership being severely limited.[citation needed]
Some clans, such as Mac Fhirbhisigh and Ó Duibhgeannáin were originally hereditaryecclesiastical families, while others (Ó Cléirigh, Mac an Bhaird,Ó Domhnallain) were dispossessed royalty who were forced to find another profession (see alsoIrish medical families).
The transmission of this body oflore (Irish:seanchas) has resulted in detailed knowledge on the origins and history of many of the tribes and families of Ireland. An anglicized tradition has continued since the 17th-century, translating many of the scripts into English. The practice of genealogy continues to be of importance among the Irish and itsdiaspora. Historians (such as Dáibhí Ó Cróinín andNollaig Ó Muraíle) consider the Irish genealogical tradition to have the largest national corpus in Europe.[citation needed]
Over the course of several centuries, an evolvinggenealogicaldogma created by thebardic tradition viewed all Irish as descendants ofMíl Espáine. This ignored variant traditions, including those recorded in their own works. The reasons behind the doctrine's adoption are rooted in the policies of dynastic and political propaganda.[citation needed]
The first Irish historian who questioned the reliability of such accounts wasDubhaltach Mac Fhirbhisigh (d. 1671), whose massive Leabhar na nGenealach included disparate and variant recensions. UnlikeGeoffrey Keating'sForas Feasa ar Éirinn, he did not attempt to synthesize the material into a unified whole, instead recording and transmitting it unaltered. However, historians as late as such asEugene O'Curry (1794–1862) andJohn O'Donovan (1806–1861) sometimes accepted the doctrine and a nationalistic interpretation of Irish history uncritically. During the 20th century the doctrine was reinterpreted by the work of historians such asEoin MacNeill,T. F. O'Rahilly,Francis John Byrne,Kathleen Hughes (historian), andKenneth Nicholls.[citation needed]
Annála Ríoghachta Éireann: Annals of the kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters, from the earliest period to the year 1616, compiled 1628–1635,Mícheál Ó Cléirighet al (edited and translated byJohn O'Donovan, 1856)
Seán Ó Donnabháin, An Cúigiú Máistir,Nollaig Ó Muraíle, inScoláirí Gaeilge: Léchtaí Cholm Cille XXVII, Eag. R. Ó hUiginn. Maigh Nuad, 1997, Lch. 11–82
Irish genealogical collections: the Scottish dimension,Nollaig Ó Muraíle, inInternational Congress of Celtic Studies 10 (1995), pp. 251–264, 1999
Iris Mhuintir Uì Dhonnabháin, O'Donovan History 2000, Published by the O'Donovan Clan,Skibbereen, Ireland. Article by Michael R. O'Donovan
The Tribes of Galway, Adrian James Martyn, Galway, 2001
Royal Roots, Republican Inheritance – The Survival of the Office of Arms, Susan Hood,Dublin, 2002
"They’re family!": cultural geographies of relatedness in popular genealogy, Catherine Nash, in Sara Armed, Anne-Marie Fortier and Mimi Sheller eds. Uprootings/Regroundings: Questions of Home and Migration, Berg, Oxford and New York, 179–203, 2003
De Praesulibus Hiberniae Commentarius,Sir James Ware, 1665
Ogygia: seu Rerum Hibernicarum Chronologia & etc. ...,Ruaidhrí Ó Flaithbheartaigh, 1685 (published and translated into English by Rev. James Hely, 1783)
A dissertation on the origin and antiquities of the antient Scots, and notes, critical and explanatory, on Mr. O'Flaherty's text,Charles O'Conor (historian), included inThe Ogygia vindicated: against the objections of Sir George Mackenzie, king's advocate for Scotland in the reign of king James II, byRuaidhrí Ó Flaithbheartaigh, 1775
On the Heathen State and Topography of Ancient Ireland, Charles O'Conor, 1783
Lecturers on the Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History,Eugene O'Curry, 1861, a collection of 21 lectures
Placenames and early settlement in county Donegal,Dónall Mac Giolla Easpaig, inDonegal: History and Society, edited by William Nolan, Liam Ronayne andMairéad Dunlevy. Dublin, 1996. pp. 149–182.
