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~ Ancestry Maher/Meagher/Meachair

Maher Matters

Category Archives: Ireland Pilgrimage

Home Is A Web of Connections

14 Sunday Jul 2019

Posted by Janet Maher in Connecticut Irish, Ireland Pilgrimage, Kilkenny Mahers, Naugatuck

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Ireland, Irish Ancestry, Irish-American

My long hiatus in writing may be over, if only to share in stages some glimpses of my fifth pilgrimage/journey to Ireland. Although so much of my scholarship in relation to this place did not neatly fit into a conventional academic trajectory, it nonetheless led directly to teaching for one month in this most special and beautiful place. My science colleague/friend and I began a new study abroad program! Since life does not always wrap up chapters of our lives fluidly, I am especially grateful that my sense of true north that prevailed over the years transitioned me in this way to a point of great change.

Returning to Ballyvaughan, not as an artist-in-residence this time, but as a professor bringing students to share experiences and learn in a deeply meaningful way felt somewhat to me not like being in Ireland initially. We group of Americans doing a certain kind of work, albeit in a different place, seemed strangely familiar, as every new semester is accompanied by its own sets of uncertainties. Without benefit of a car or solitude I needed to be in this familiar area in a new way and dispel the transformative memories that continually arose seeking attention I could not afford to give them. It was necessary to pare down my expectations and become utterly patient. Perhaps after another very intense year of work this was what all of us needed. Extraordinary leaders of our field trips, however, revealed in their own ways aspects of the magic that wasn’t perceptible to me at first, and allowed my friend and me to share new and direct experiences along with our students. I so appreciated the time and poetic, eloquent sharing of information that many individuals, especially Patrick McCormack, Gordan D’Arcy and Eddie Lenihan offered us.

I explained to my friend, who was visiting Ireland for the first time, that when in this place I tend to feel as if I am a character in a fairy tale. Practical difficulties must be dealt with at first as I search for my bearings. I must shed much of the drive and focus that brought me to the first leg of the journey. Once begun, it then takes on a life of its own. I must ask directions, follow instructions strangers provide and pass through one challenge after another, each seemingly more complex and unexpected. There is a learning or re-learning of even simple things—bus and train systems, denominations of money, making it through a shortcut path in the woods without getting lost and figuring out SIM cards and hotspots. With each challenge passed the reward seems greater, the emotional impact is stronger and eventually it becomes possible to feel present and comfortable. This time it was necessary to perform a role within the unanticipated restrictions and complexities that, thankfully, came to a truly satisfying and successful result. Four weeks went by very quickly and a new group of individuals were embraced by the resident community, experiencing more and different things than any of us might have imagined.

During one week more my friend and I became tourists and transitioned into the kind of free-form wandering that I love best to do. This is how I feel most spiritually at home in Ireland. My cells and soul had recognized a deep connection to the midlands from my first visit. My intellect finally caught up with emotions and sensations about all of Ireland and her history. All of myself now works together there. I have walked and driven over so many miles that I can envision a web created over years that a tracking device might have been able to illuminate. (Perhaps someday I will draw some version of this, like delicate crochet.)

Deep and wide research, digging, seeking multiple sources for every fact, acknowledging doors that might never wish to open was necessary in exploring my mysterious ancestral history with its many Irish surnames. Being in contact with living people has been utterly necessary in order to fully perceive what my quest has been about. With each detail of the possible stories that have come into focus a calm, settled feeling has taken hold in me—and even miracles have occurred! I have felt that the ancestors dropped sequential clues, made themselves slightly more clear in stages as if acknowledging my effort paid forward while trying to learn about them. With this visit my visible and invisible teachers provided a true treasure!

With only two days left, my friend and I found ourselves driving along a winding road in Kilkenny that led higher and higher up a mountain to what we expected would reveal the small townland in which one of my great-great grandmothers had lived pre-immigration. Before leaving America someone had already confirmed my research. The Internet had provided the location of the ancient cemetery associated with her parish. The road, however, led instead to a farm at the top of the world, looking out over the other counties between which my questions had continually been weaving back and forth. Suddenly we were being invited into my ancestor’s former home! The joy of the current owner’s family regarding an American relative’s return deepened this gift exponentially, and my friend’s presence allowed me to fully feel the profundity of our visit. She had the wherewithal to take notes and snap photos while I was overcome and could only concentrate upon conversing with these gracious individuals as best as I could manage. Feeling entirely blessed by them it appeared that this portion of my quest had come to an actual fairy tale ending. I am thrilled to know that I now have a new family of friends to add to the dear ones we also visited on this trip.

It is about the people with whom and within the places in which I’ve had soulful experiences that my interior world has been created. As with friends and relatives in America, the return to a person and a place is a constant. What we do together, combined with our solitary explorations, continues to build upon the truths we’ve shared. When apart a psychic web remains.

Ireland is no longer a foreign place to me. I continue to study her history and pose new questions about her with as much curiosity and excitement as ever. Actual friends are there, even if I do not see them often. One has visited me in America. I hope that others will. Through my immersion in the homeland of my ancestors my experience of the world has grown and deepened. The awareness of connections held in energetic space has made it more possible for me to trust that the Universe provides what I need, moment after moment. I feel that our last week in Ireland provided the firm grounding from which the rest of my life will proceed.

Having not mentioned “Maher” at all yet, I’ll share that when handing over my passport and answering the airline worker’s questions before our departure, I habitually spelled out my always mispronounced and unfamiliar last name, then my friend’s. The attendant smiled and pleasantly replied, “There’s no need to spell those names here!” Laughter and joy, we belonged!

©2019 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

Art & Science in Ireland!

12 Sunday May 2019

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, Connecticut Irish, County Clare, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage, Mahers, Tombstone Transcriptions

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Art & Science Collaboration, Burren College of Art, County Clare, Ireland Study Abroad

It is with excited anticipation that my friend and I are now preparing our Loyola University Maryland courses for a paired Art and Science experience in County Clare, Ireland. Our students and we will be at the Burren College of Art from the end of May through the end of June! We will use Instagram primarily to post aspects we wish to share. I intend to also post here, hoping that those who follow this blog will find the images and text to be interesting, even if not directly Maher-related. Looking through digital photographs from my artist residency three years ago at the College, I found two of Maher graves at Corcomroe Abbey (above). Maher references never fail to find me in my extensive journeys within Ireland and Connecticut. Sometimes a hovering spot appears in an image, as on the Patrick Maher grave here. Perhaps I’m superstitious, but I interpret this phenomenon as a spirit visitation, making its support of my continued search for illusive answers known!

That the rabbit hole of my Irish research and in-depth genealogy work since 2006 has brought me to this point in time feels astonishing. The many years of following my instincts as an artist, continually evolving my teaching, and allowing myself to veer onto a path of research that seemed (to some) to have led my decades of artwork trajectory astray has beautifully come full circle to the present! This new Study Abroad opportunity for Loyola creates a collaboration between Fine Arts and Biology — and will also be the culmination of my teaching career. I am thrilled that it also brings me to Ireland for a fifth time! Until our adventure begins, please enjoy my various Ireland boards on Pinterest and enjoy Mother’s Day!

©2019 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

Ireland 2016, Last – Ireland Images.10

04 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage

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Connemara ©2016 Janet Maher

So much about my last few days in Ireland was privately wonderful due to the people with whom I shared many additional experiences. The end of my fourth trip to this magical place was more about re-connecting with people who have already become part of my present while meeting more through the connections of these friends and my stays with once-strangers via airbnb. What my husband used to call my “obsession with dead Irishmen” has come fully into the land of the living. There are no more tears upon leaving, nor a sense that I may never see these people or be here again. It was simply time to come home. It may be quite a while until next time, but I feel there will be another before my life is truly over.

In the multi-location contemporary art exhibition in Limerick, Still (The) Barbarians, that Karen and I saw a few weeks back, Alice Maher’s character in her poetically disturbing video whispered at the end, “Sometimes I am too full of dead men.” The letting go of the dead and the turbulent past is an intentional process that requires constant work, particularly in a place where collective memories seem to fill the air and permeate the land and the buildings that exist upon it. At one of my airbnbs my host actively works to heal individuals’ and the earth’s energy in the historic location he has adopted. The ancient forest on what is now his property is being returned to its sacred roots. The place, without much fanfare, attracts others like me who sense its specialness from its online description. We arrive open, with no expectations but what will be experienced in response to being there.

The drive across from the west to the midlands along a more northern parallel allowed me to see new places that had appeared in my earlier research. That the drive felt oddly as if simply traveling around Connecticut was also interesting, and that a whole portion seemed placenames-wise to relate to Rhode Island. How closely connected the areas were that I had studied in Laois, Kilkenny and Tipperary continued to be revealed, further supporting hypotheses I had made in Waterbury Irish and From the Old Sod to the Naugatuck Valley.

That the weather upon return was more like an Irish summer than an American one was very welcome to me. As I settle back into and pick up my other life again, I hold in my heart the people across the Atlantic who are so dear to me, many with whom I will surely remain in touch. A place and one’s experience in relation to it has everything to do with people and the interactions that are possible with them. Ireland is now not only about physical earthly beauty and the ease with which her people live together despite centuries of tragedy and hardship. For me Ireland is about Jane, Caitriona, Anna, Josephine, Eugene, Austin, Oliver, George, Carmel, Ellie and the Flaggy Shore women, Mary, Lisa, Ava, Mrs. Linnane and her cousin, Mikie and Christina, Mike and Mathew, Simon, Bridget, Anne and all the people from America who came to the Burren to allow their souls to delve in a very special way into the universal well of the Creative. I can only be forever grateful and attempt moving forward to remain focused from the still point that has been returned to me.

Some last photos from almost 4,000 taken, having driven more than 2,200 miles:

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An Ghaeltacht ©2016 Janet Maher

If Irish is still spoken there and signs are written both ways, know that you will find beauty and friendliness! Cars will not honk at you. People will greet each other and wave fingers or a hand from their steering wheels when encountering other cars or people walking by the side of the quiet roads.

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Monument Sign in Recess, Connemara ©2016 Janet Maher

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Shot from Alice Maher’s video at Cleeve’s Condensed Milk Factory, Limerick ©2016 Janet Maher

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President Obama and a Pint at Hayes Bar, Moneygall ©2016 Janet Maher

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Across the Way from Kylemore Abbey, Connemara ©2016 Janet Maher

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The Cliffs of Achill Island ©2016 Janet Maher

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Intersection at Mountmellick ©2016 Janet Maher

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Other Side of Intersection, Mountmellick ©2016 Janet Maher

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Fintan Phelan Bakery, Port Laoise ©2016 Janet Maher

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Between Port Laoise and Abbeyleix ©2016 Janet Maher

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Bergin’s Pub, Port Laoise ©2016 Janet Maher

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Between Port Laoise and Abbeyleix.2 ©2016 Janet Maher

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Steeple of Ballinakill Church As Seen From Heywood Gardens ©2016 Janet Maher

Jane and I went looking for Kileany, in Laois, as I still wondered about the location regarding a detail in previous posts I had made here: Meagher Women, Some New Connections and The Mahers of Kilkenny. The town seems mostly gone, and there is no sign, although GPS finds the area. Might this formerly strong farmer’s house not far from Saint Fintan’s Well have tied to an earlier William Maher?

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Kileany House ©2016 Janet Maher

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Going Forward ©2016 Janet Maher

 

Thank you to those who have accompanied me on this journey, literally and/or virtually. May we all be helped in keeping to our paths as our hearts direct us. Slán!

©2016 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

Ireland Images.7 – Still Point

19 Sunday Jun 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, County Clare, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage

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As might be expected, I’ve taken a multitude of photographs. There are several collections going of certain topics. One is of the many instances of houses that look like the classic style we first draw as children, perfect geometry.

The artist’s book that I completed yesterday has a similar structure, though the relationship to these houses was quite accidental. From the side, if the front cover is opened the structure becomes houselike. The internal pages are designed to work as single squares made of two opposing triangles with a series of knots between them. I have called it Still Point, after Eliot. That will also be the title of the show I hope to have with work from this project, much of which needs to be completed after I get home.

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Ireland House #1 ©2016 Janet Maher

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Still Point (artist’s book) ©2016 Janet Maher

Ireland Images.6 – The Flaggy Shore, Again

18 Saturday Jun 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, County Clare, Ireland Pilgrimage

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Flaggy Shore Fossils ©2016 Janet Maher

Ballyvaughan.3 – The Burren

16 Thursday Jun 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, County Clare, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage, Meaghers

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Poulnabrone Portal Tomb ©2016 Janet Maher

Poulnabrone Portal Tomb ©2016 Janet Maher

It is going to be so very strange not to see magnificent rocks enmeshed with grasses and wildflowers around me upon return to the states. Time has done that tricky thing in that I feel as if this present will continue now forever. Having done a good bit of exploring and learning over the past three weeks, it may be possible to write a bit about this very special place.

Expert Gordan D’Arcy explained in a lecture how the phenomenon of the Burren was glacially created millions of years ago when all the earth’s land masses were connected. If we try, we can see how the edges of what became eastern North America had once separated from what became Ireland, which had separated from what became England, floating apart. No wonder the landscape and dry walls of the New England states come to mind so often here, and why so many Irish immigrants chose that area of America in which to place new roots.

Erratic ©2016 Janet Maher

Erratic ©2016 Janet Maher

According to D’Arcy Ireland was originally a jagged habitat with higher hills like China has. Changes from about one and one half million years after the end of the first Ice Age forward have resulted in what exists now. The borders of Ireland extended much further too, having been worn back to the cliffs, additional islands and jaggy shores of today. The Cliffs of Moher, for example, had extended about 100 meters further than they do now. What remains is the Burren limestone and granite that has not been washed and weathered away. Ireland had been covered by a shallow tropical sea, as evidenced by fossil imprints in the rocks. Marks in the stone were also created as other stones were dragged across while glaciers receded. Large granite boulders called erratics occur, sitting as if placed intentionally in various parts of the Burren. A fascinating occurrence appears in rocks from snails having eaten their calcium away. The rocks are peppered with regular-shaped circular crevices and sinuous trails.

Inis Oirr, Aran, Flowers ©2016 Janet Maher

Inis Oirr, Aran, Flowers ©2016 Janet Maher

Within the Burren, extending through Galway, are a vast array of plants that exist where they normally would not. Some came into Ireland with previous glacial activity from the north, leaving arctic seeds that thrive where the stone provides just enough shelter and alkaline surface for them to attach. Thin build-ups of acidic soil blown in from neighboring areas such as Tipperary fill in holes in the stone and provide a different environment that can likewise sustain plants. Neutral mixtures between the two support still other types. There are about 950 species of flora in Ireland, some of them rare. Seven hundred of them are found in the Burren. Thirty–two of the thirty-four species of butterflies are also found here.

Aillwee Cave ©2016 Janet Maher

Aillwee Cave ©2016 Janet Maher

All around is the physical evidence of ancient history, layers upon layers of time co-existing with the present. The 5200-5800 year old Poulnabrone Dolman is a tomb that held a royal dynasty of thirty-three people. The area has about 70 of these upright tombs from about 4,000 years ago when the Burren was heavily populated. Archeology work on the Caherconnell Stone Fort revealed evidence of human occupation from several different time periods, including a burial site from the early 6th/late 7th century. The Caherconnell Archaeological Project continues. The Aillwee Cave has been relatively dry for the last 10,000 years but its origin dates back two million. Created from what was once a river flowing above the floor upon which visitors walk, the current dampness and seepage of rainwater from above has been incrementally forming delicate stalactites over thousands of years.

In a small cave near Ennis a recent exciting discovery of bear remains containing evidence of human butchering has placed the existence of humans in Ireland 2,500 years father back in time than was thought–to at least 10,500 B.C. “That is 8,000 years before the Egyptian pyramids were built and 7,500 years earlier than the first Stonehenge monuments.”

That highly evolved Irish septs following Brehon Laws existed from pre-Christian times throughout the many centuries before England’s turbulent colonization calls for the need to study the Milesian clans in parallel with dynasties of much more publicized areas such as Egypt and Asia. The Meaghers were certainly among the notable septs from their original base as abbots at Monaincha and in their surroundings in the vicinity of Roscrea, Tipperary.

©2016 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

Ireland Images.5 – Corcomroe Abbey

12 Sunday Jun 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, County Clare, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage

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Corcomroe Abbey, Co. Clare, Ireland ©2016 Janet Maher

Corcomroe Abbey, Co. Clare, Ireland ©2016 Janet Maher

Clouds Over Stones, Corcomroe Abbey ©2016 Janet Maher

Clouds Over Stones, Corcomroe Abbey ©2016 Janet Maher

One of Three Maher Graves, Corcomroe Abbey ©2016 Janet Maher

One of Three Maher Graves, Corcomroe Abbey ©2016 Janet Maher

©2016 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

Ireland Images.3

06 Monday Jun 2016

Posted by Janet Maher in Art in Ireland, County Clare, Ireland Images, Ireland Pilgrimage

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Thatched Roof House On the Road to Fanore (Very Much Alive!) ©2016 Janet Maher

Thatched Roof House On the Road to Fanore (Very Much Alive!) ©2016 Janet Maher

Pilgrimage to Ireland, Part 4: Roscrea & Ikerrin, Tipperary

20 Friday Jun 2014

Posted by Janet Maher in Ikerrin, Ireland Pilgrimage, Mahers, Meachairs, Meaghers

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Irish Midland Ancestry, Irish pilgrimage, Joseph Casimir O'Meagher

©2014 Caitriona Meagher, Roscrea, Looking Toward Clonan, artist unknown, image given to C. Meagher by G. Cunningham

©2014 Caitriona Meagher, Roscrea, Looking Toward Clonan, artist unknown, image given to C. Meagher by G. Cunningham. With gratitude to them!

Those who know me from many years back on Jane Lyon’s Y-IRL list serve or from my earlier web sites will no doubt recall my excitement about discovering Joseph Casimir O’Meagher’s Some Historical Notices of the O’Meaghers of Ikerrin, published in 1890. Its compilation of myriad facts and details became my bible, not only through which to learn about my father’s surname, but as a means to begin to study the history of Ireland herself. Names of places that had seemed so difficult to pronounce or remember eventually became familiar, and the differences between provinces, counties, baronies, townlands and civil or religious parishes, among a great many other things, also became clear. That boundaries and jurisdictions continually changed, as they do in all developing civilizations, reminded me to always note the time frame of an historical detail, as one decade’s information might vary greatly from another’s, some event having caused any number of ripple effects.

©2014 Janet Maher, Monainha Graves

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha Graves

While we may know that the original location for the Meaghers was in northeast Tipperary, in and near the town of Roscrea, we also know that due to all the turmoil over the centuries individuals and families chose to (or were forced to) spread further throughout Tipperary, relocate to other regions, or leave home entirely. From the time of Oliver Cromwell’s entry into Ireland question marks pepper every Gaelic Irish surname’s history. O’Meagher’s text underpinned and provided a context for everything I had learned so far. My studies of surnames based in the Tippeary/Kilkenny/Laois area had brought me to a point of simply wishing to walk or drive through particular areas in real time, gaining a felt sense of the distances between places.

What of Roscrea, the main town within the barony of Ikerrin (Ui Cairin), associated with the O’Meachairs/Meaghers/Mahers? After all the dispersals, transportations, emigrations, deaths, how relative to a current Maher from another country might Ikerrin be? It was in this questioning state of mind that I looked forward to meeting Caitriona Meagher on my journey—someone with whom I had become an email correspondent in the past year. Caitriona, and her cousin, Anna, whom I was also delighted to have met the following week, are among perhaps very few members of the Meagher/Maher clan who know and can point to locations that show their family connecting back to O’Meaghers mentioned in Joseph Casimir O’Meagher’s work. Caitriona’s family still lives within an extended area of land upon which Clonan Castle once existed (“Clonyne/Cloyne” in Some Historical Notices, depicted on pg. 18). It was with great excitement that I went to visit her, and I am so grateful for the thrilling day we spent together.

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonan Cows

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonan Cows

We met at her mother’s home, and Caitriona immediately brought me outside to the perfect spot from which to look out over all of what used to be the barony, a wide circle recessed in the center, spreading out for miles. The base had been a lake with about a two acre island in it — Lough Cré (Inishnameo), the Island of the Living. Gesturing outwards she told me, “All the castles were along the ridge, around the perimeter,” and she pointed to the division where Ikerrin left off and the land of their kinsmen, Ely O’Carroll, began. Through binoculars we could slightly make out two partial castles directly across the way (which I found the following day). She explained that Clonakenny Castle (Caisleán Cluain an Chaoinaigh), toward our far right, was in the safest section, protected by all the other outlying castle communities. Although we did not see them, Caitriona said that evidence remains of ancient ring forts in the area too, and that farmers through the ages have avoided them, both for superstitious reasons and in honoring their historic importance. The image at the head of this essay shows some top portions of Clonan Castle at the horizon (“bumps” that interrupt the curve), evidence of the castle’s formerly great size, the top of which could be seen from within the town of Roscrea over a mountain.

A few days ago, when looking into the Tithe Applotment records of around 1826, I noticed that among the many Meaghers living throughout that extended area in the early nineteenth century, several clustered into townlands within the civil parish of Roscrea, and several clustered within the townlands in the parish of Bourney. I asked Caitriona about this via email and she explained, regarding the Roscrea area, “If you could imagine making a 3.5 mile diameter circle, and then walking out the front door in Clonan and putting it down on your left, then all of these places would be in it.” Regarding Bourney, she said, “If you made a similar 8-ish mile circle and put it down on your right, these places would be in it.” I love that there now is the memory of our standing in place looking out over it all, to which she can make such a reference that I, in turn, understand!

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha Sign

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha Sign

Despite all the dispersions, before the Great Famine there was once again a very large concentration of Meaghers/Mahers in the area of the clan’s origin. Given the Meaghers’ interconnected ties through fortuitous marriages with Butlers and other Norman Old English landlords, and their ancient claims to the lands in the area, not only would some of them have found their way back to their ancestral homes, but many from the laborer class may never have been forced to leave. We know that throughout Ireland there were instances of upper class Gaelic families having their properties taken, but being “allowed” to remain as laborers on what had been their own land. The newly planted landlords needed workers, and, especially within the midlands, many landlords became absentee, which left the locals much to their own devices as before the upsets. Some who had been transported may have later been able to return as tenants, sometimes through agreeing to suppress their religious practice or through the kindness of those whom Martin Callanan categorized as “friendly Protestants” (Records of Four Tipperary Septs, 1938).

Whether they remained in place or relocated, by mandate or by choice, all Meaghers, Caitriona confirmed, anciently came from this area. Although the surname has been scattered to the winds over centuries, for any Maher/Meagher looking into their Irish history, we can know that some deep ancestor had lived here at one time. Although I had felt this to likely be true in theory, I was so glad to hear her say this aloud! Yes, we all come from here. Period. And our line at some cellular level is, thus, ancient. In conversing about this later with Anna, she called it a dynasty, noting parallels to ancient lineages in other countries in which that term is commonly used. O’Meagher history was richly documented by Joseph Casimir O’Meagher, and there likely do not exist paper trails deeper than those that he found.

©2014 Janet Maher, Ely O'Carroll Sign, Dublin Road, Tipperary

©2014 Janet Maher, Ely O’Carroll Sign, Dublin Road, Tipperary

Caitriona noted that originally Irish land was not registered to a certain owner. This came later, with British rules. “We o Meachairs would have floated around the barony a lot before that. Then we began to settle in certain areas.” The ancient family groups (tuathas) worked their common lands together, moving into different fields as their own farming practices determined and using naturally occurring land formations as designated perimeters of their properties, which extended great distances. Early on, struggles would have been simply about trying to maintain or expand their holdings and protect them from encroachment by other native Irish.

©2014 Janet Maher, Interior, Monaincha

©2014 Janet Maher, Interior, Monaincha

The web site of Ireland’s Reaching Out group explains Roscrea’s “long and proud heritage” as “stretching back over six thousand years,” and O’Meagher’s “notices” bring us back to before the time of Saint Patrick’s conversion visit to Ireland. He referenced a seventeenth century text by Rev. John Colgan, a Franciscan friar in Louvain, who wrote of Saint Patrick’s travel in 470 A.D. to the area that became the barony of Lower Ormond (Butler), baptizing, Mechair and two other “brothers of that nation—men of power…the sons of Forat, son of Conla (son of Tadg, son of Cian, son of Olioll Olum).” O’Meagher explained the Milesian linage of the surname as descending “from Fionnachada, son of Connla, son of Cian, second son of Oiliol Olum, King of Munster in the third century.” (pp.13, 14)

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha, Tipperary

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha, Tipperary

Caitriona brought me to two ancient ecclesiastical sites of at least equal importance to others that are more well-known and have been somewhat restored. Both tie to the ancient history of the O’Meaghers/Mahers. The monastic site of Monaincha (Bog of the Island) and the Sean Ross Abbey, founded by Saint Cronan, brought more references in O’Meagher’s book completely to life for me, enhanced by recently hearing historian George Cunningham’s fascinating narration about them. (An MP3 version of his audio tour may be purchased here.)

To follow the growth of what Mr. Cunningham called “the cradle of Christianity” in this area, we look first to the abbey that 7th century Saint Cronan founded at Sean Ross, in a wild and remote section of Ikerrin. When he realized that the place was too far away for people to locate him, he moved into the main town and founded Saint Cronan’s Monastery in Roscrea. Here, his monk, Dimma MacNathi, scribed over forty days and nights the famous Book of Dimma, contained in the collection of Trinity College’s library. An ornate shrine was created to contain the book, financed by Lord O’Carroll, in the 12th century. Around the 1480s the monks wanted to get away from the bustle of the city and returned to the more contemplative location of Sean Ross. This became the parish of Corbally (Corville). O’Meaghers continued to be priors, and O’Meaghers were buried in the graveyard there. Remains of a medieval church are also still there, however, the area is now known more for its special education school for those with learning disabilities, Saint Anne’s, which was begun in 1971. Its earlier modern incarnation, beginning in the 1930s, was as a convent home for unwed mothers. It was there that Michael Hess and his birth mother, Philomena Lee, tried to find each other. This heart-breaking story was made into the film, Philomena, last year, starring Judi Dench and Steve Coogan.

©2014 Janet Maher, Michael Hess Grave at Sean Ross

©2014 Janet Maher, Michael Hess Grave at Sean Ross

O’Meagher’s book contains an excellent map that shows the island of Monaincha (formerly Inchanambro) without the lake, revealing two amoeba shaped ends connected by bogland containing an Abbey Church, Abbot’s apartments, two churches, surrounded by “the ancient Wood non-a Bog” and remains of the Abbot’s orchard. O’Meagher explained that Thaddeus Meachair (Blessed Thaddeus) had become Bishop of Cork and Cloyne after the resignation of William Roche in 1490 (pg. 16). One of the authors of the Annals of the Old Masters in 1664 added a reference to the ritual of crowning O’Meagher rulers, noting that “the steed and battledress of every Lord of them belong to the Comarba of Cronan and Inchanambro…” He further explained that Saint Cronan was the patron saint of Roscrea, and Comarba referred to his successor. Inchanambro, “also in O’Meagher’s country, “was the name of ‘the island of the living,'” later called Lady’s Island. Signage from the Office of Public Works and their Destination Cashel explained that Elarius (St. Elair, or Hilary), who died in 807 A.D., had founded “an important monastery” on the Island of the Living, which began to follow Augustinian rule in 1140 A.D, where the monks remained until 1485. Monaincha’s high cross base was created in the 9th century, but the Celtic cross head dates from three centuries later. Around the grounds of the church are several old graves, including some small Famine Stones. Inside there are still some monuments for a few of the primary people that had been associated with Monaincha. Much of the bog was harvested for fuel over the centuries, leaving only the footprint of a small raised landscape supporting this once quite significant medieval sacred site, two large trees seeming to bravely protect what is left.

©2014 Janet Maher, map of Monaincha, J.C. O'Meagher, Some Historical Notices of the O'Meaghers of Ikerrin

©2014 Janet Maher, map of Monaincha, J.C. O’Meagher, Some Historical Notices of the O’Meaghers of Ikerrin

Giraldus Cambrenis, Gerald the Welshman, wrote about The Monastery of the Island of the Living (Mainistir Inse na mBeo) in 1187. He said, “There is a lake in North Munster with a large island which has a church of an ancient religious order. No woman or animal of the female sex could enter this island without dying immediately. This has been put to the proof many times by means of the cats, dogs and other animals of that sex, which have often been brought to it as a test, and have died at once.” O’Meagher noted that Cambrensis visited there in 1185 (pg. 13). P. W. Joyce explained in 1911 that the miraculous tradition was that it was said to have not been possible for anyone guilty of a great sin to die on the island. Even if they were very ill, it would not be until they left the island that they could actually die. Likewise, if people tried to bury on the island “an unrepentant sinner” who had died somewhere else, there would inevitably be some problem that would not make the burial possible. Even after the monks left the island, the church and its grounds were frequently visited. “About two centuries ago,” Joyce wrote, “the owner drained the lake, forbade all pilgrimages and burials, destroyed the tombs, and had a circular fence built around the church.” (LibraryIreland)

Caitrionia explained, “At Móin na hInse we have a long series of documents from the Holy See dealing with the Priory in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. It was a place of importance and its Prior one of the more outstanding dignitaries of the diocese, so that very many Papal Mandates are addressed to him to deal with the unfortunate disputes which were then so common in the struggle of laymen to gain control of the clerical revenues. The connection of the O Meaghers of Ui Cairn and their control of the Priory is almost continuous throughout the whole period…In A.D. 1350 the Pope issued an Indult to Thady O Meagher and his wife to choose their own Confessor…No doubt the O Meagher succession and control continued up to the Reformation.”

©2014 Janet Maher, Marty Maher Dedication

©2014 Janet Maher, Marty Maher Dedication

We also had a look from a distance at Clonakenny Castle, recently privately purchased, and Caitriona brought me to see an honorary plaque in a local church cemetery for Marty Maher, about whom a John Ford film was made (The Long Grey Line, 1955). We ended back at her mother’s home, where we had a wonderful visit and enjoyed tea and scones at a beautifully laid-out table. Caitriona’s brother and his daughter also stopped by. I am grateful to Mrs. Meagher and her family for the warm welcome, and to Caitriona, who parted the veils for me in such a way that I felt, “OK, I can go home now!” only partway into my journey. I look forward to building a friendship with Caitriona and Anna into the future.

A recent green-energy effort has established a large section of windmills in the area, named after the area’s sacred site. They may be a disturbing hindrance to some local residents. They proved, however, to serve as excellent landmarks for me, as I recalled seeing them from Clonan, and various other angles as we drove around. I found myself in the following days near some of the spots that Caitriona introduced to me, each in various relative proxmities to the windmills. More about Tipperary in Part 5!

Thank you to Caitrion Meagher for her contributions to this piece!

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha Windfarm

©2014 Janet Maher, Monaincha Windfarm

©2014 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

All Rights Reserved

Pilgrimage to Ireland, Part 3: North Tipperary, Clonmacnoise &

10 Tuesday Jun 2014

Posted by Janet Maher in Clonmacnoise, Ireland Pilgrimage, Mahers, Meaghers, Pilgrimage, Uncategorized

≈ 13 Comments

Tags

Ancient Irish Art & Artifacts, Early Irish History, Irish Catholic History, Irish Midland Ancestry

 

©2014 Janet Maher, View from Margaret & Alfie's

©2014 Janet Maher, View from Margaret & Alfie’s

During the first days before my clothes arrived I learned to drive on the left side of the road and navigate with increasing ease through the country. My second AirBNB hosts proved to be the ideal support system. Margaret O’Farrell and Alfie McCaffrey were very helpful in following up on my lost luggage and with my puzzling through various technology issues—getting my phone to transition properly, figuring out if my throw-away phone from three years ago might work with a new chip, trying in vain for my GPS to kick back in (which it never did) and even helping me arrange visits with people I was trying to meet while my phone was in limbo. After three days I felt that I was leaving new friends. In Lorrha, Northern Tipperary, this couple has been renovating a large, stately home with their own tender loving care. Like so many a place in which good personally-grown food and fascinating, friendly conversation is a staple, Margaret and Alfie’s kitchen is at its heart. (Pay the extra to have dinner with them at night, which became extend visits in our case, lasting until 11:30 or so.)

©2014 Janet Maher, Old Farm, Lorrha, Tipperary

©2014 Janet Maher, Old Farm, Lorrha, Tipperary

Outside, chickens and roosters wandered as they will among the grass, flowers and trees, joined by their two dogs, with additional sound effects from a drove of pigs in the back. Frisky fellows, the pigs sometimes rule the roost, getting out from their pen and requiring hours of tracking and coaxing back to their own digs. From the kitchen porch, which runs the entire width of the house, it is possible to see the *Devil’s Bit section of the Slieve Bloom Mountains—the landmark for things Maher/Meagher. We had the most enjoyable breakfast looking in its direction on my last day, shared with a friend of Margaret and Alfie who had volunteered to help repair the woodshed roof. Pure bliss to eat outside amid so much beauty and such excellent company!

While navigating the way back and forth to their home in the woods (follow the signs for Birr and Portunma), I was able to venture north into Offaly County and into and around Roscrea, my primary destination on the first part of this Maher-related journey. Alfie had recommended also seeing Birr Castle, with its impressive Science Center, including a 72-inch long reflecting telescope built in 1845, and its note-worthy gardens. I came into Birr too late on the day I was venturing in those parts to do more than a drive-by, so this is now on my list for a hoped-for Next Time. At the end of my journey the following week I learned that the castle, owned by the Earls of Rosse, had once been owned by Meaghers. (More research needs to go into verifying that.)

* The Small Gap of Ely, in the parish of Barnane-Ely was written about by Joseph Casimir O’Meagher in 1890. (The O’Carrolls ruled over Ely, with close ties to the O’Meaghers of neighboring Ikerrin Barony.) He explained the nickname for the dip in the mountains with the following tale: “The Devil, driven to frenzy by his want of success among the inhabitants of Ikerrin, took a bit of their mountain in revenge, but finding it too heavy was obliged to drop it in the ‘Golden Vale,’ where it became the Rock of Cashel, afterwards famous as the residence of the Kings of Munster, and the site of one of the finest cathedrals in the west of Europe. The rock would about fill the gap in the mountain. Another story is that he dropped the bit in Queen’s County, and that the Rock of DunaMase was thus formed.” (Some Historical Notices of the O’Meaghers of Ikerrin, pg. 127.) (That there is a large cross at the top of this mountain was a surprising parallel, I thought, to that of the locally famous one in my hometown in Connecticut, of the same vintage, recently restored to great success and celebration. Had I more time I would have taken a hike to the top of the Devil’s Bit—#2 on my Next Time list.)

©2014 Janet Maher, Alfie , feeding his rooks

©2014 Janet Maher, Alfie, feeding his rooks

Another place that was closed during my visit, but seems worth a tour if staying so nearby was Redwood Castle, especially for those with Egan or Kennedy roots. (With that in mind, I include here an image of a place I passed on the way out of Limerick. For those with Killduff roots, here is a photo of a former Killduff Castle, now on the grounds of  St. Anthony’s Nursing Home, Pallasgreen, Limerick.)

©2014 Janet Maher, Killduff Castle, Limerick

©2014 Janet Maher, Killduff Castle, Limerick

Clonmacnoise (Cluain Mhic Nóis) was part of my reason for staying in North Tipperary, as we had not ventured into that area on my last trip to Ireland with my husband.  I wanted to see the place that had been mentioned so often in my studies about Ireland’s ancient history. This settlement, which dates to just before the death of its mid-6th century founder, St. Ciarán, grew to be the most desirable conquest for invaders over the centuries. Wealthy monasteries throughout Ireland were targets for their valuable ceremonial objects, and Clonmacnoise was also known as the primary site of achievements in literary and artistic high craft production during the centuries of religious rivalry in the country and in relation to Rome. Its location on a high ridge overlooking the Shannon River made it a major intersection of trade and travel.

There had been distinct roles with which Gaelic families were associated. Those that included members of high-ranking religious status had their own ecclesiastical settlements, centered upon a family church around which an extended community worked and lived. The once vast settlement of Clonmacoise contained not only a cathedral and a round tower, but a nuns’ church, and ones associated with St. Ciarán and the surnames Kelly, McLaughlin, Dowling, McLaffey, Connor, and Finghin. There are also remains of several other kinds of buildings, a castle, a sacred well, four high crosses, and other many other artifacts, including a section of an ogham stone and more than 600 portions of ancient grave slabs.

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonmacnoise Cross

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonmacnoise Cross, replica

Three of the high crosses have been removed for their protection from their original location to an on-site museum. Replica ones have been in their places to weather outside since 1992-93. Portions of three additional high crosses from the site are preserved in the National Museum of Ireland, Dublin, along with such masterful art objects as the Crozier of the Abbots and the Shrine of the Stowe Missal. The Cross of the Scriptures (replica shown here) is considered to be one of the best of Ireland’s historic crosses of this extensively decorated kind. It honors the King of Meath and King of Tara, thus High King of Ireland (879 to 916), Flann Sinna mac Maelshechnaill. At the turn of the 14th century the Gaelic clans regained control of Clonmacnoise from the Anglo-Normans, and power shifted to the MacCoghlans until the 17th century—a time of devastation in Ireland as the formerly Catholic England and Ireland were re-envisioned by King Henry VIII and Oliver Cromwell.

On the day I visited Clonmacnoise I was met with a powerful silence and stillness. Although there were far more people wandering the site with me than I expected, we all seemed to be held in a trancelike quiet as we individually absorbed an awe-full sense of the former importance and immensity of this place, now a relic of itself. Ireland’s Office of Public Works has done an exceptional job in stabilizing this and many other irreplaceable sites, touchstones to the country’s stature and nobility in the ancient world.

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonmacnoise

©2014 Janet Maher, Clonmacnoise Ruins

 

©2014 Janet Maher / Sinéad Ni Mheachair

All Rights Reserved

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