Filidh Éireann go haointeach · The poets of Ireland to one house
At Christmas 1351, Uilliam Buide Ó Ceallaigh (William Boy O'Kelly), lord of Uí Mhaine, sent word across Ireland: every poet, judge, historian and musician was welcome at his house for the feast. They came in such numbers that the gathering was remembered for centuries.
The poet Gofraidh Fionn Ó Dálaigh, a leading master of the bardic schools of Munster, marked the occasion in a long praise poem whose opening line gives it its name, roughly "the poets of Ireland go to one house". In it he pictures the guests arriving, the generosity of the host, and the rows of new dwellings put up so that each art had its own place. It made Uilliam's hospitality famous, and the Annals of Clonmacnoise echo its first verse (Dictionary of Irish Biography, "Ó Dálaigh, Gofraidh Fionn").
Source: Eleanor Knott (ed. and trans.), "Filidh Éireann go haointeach: William Ó Ceallaigh's Christmas feast to the poets of Ireland, A.D. 1351", Ériu 5 (1911), 50–69; Bardic Poetry Database, poem 932; Dictionary of Irish Biography.
Where: the feast was held at An Dún, Doon Fort, in the townland of Doon Upper, Fohenagh. The poem describes a hall of stone and timber put up for the occasion on the edge of a lake called Loch na nÉigeas, "the lake of the poets", and likens it to Emain Macha, the ancient royal seat of Ulster. Elizabeth FitzPatrick's 2016 field survey, published in Landscapes of the Learned (2023), identifies that place as Doon Fort: a raised oval platform about 60 by 50 metres with a steep edge, set between the lands of the Ó Dubhagáin and Ó Longargáin families and looking south-west over a seasonal lake now called Boggaun Lough. It sits in the same court landscape as the lord's pailís at An Lios Mór, Pallas (FitzPatrick 2023, pp. 147–149; Knott, Ériu 5, 60–61). The place kept its importance: a castle of Tadhg Ó Ceallaigh stood there in 1574, though no walls remained by 1838, and Doon House later took its place.
The court on the ground
Doon Fort, Lios Mór and Ballynabanaba are on private farmland: there is no public access. Please view them from the public road. The map shows them only as approximate areas.
- An Lios Mór (Irish form provisional), Pallas: the large enclosure FitzPatrick identifies as the lord's residence, the heart of the court.Reference: FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned (2023), pp. 147–149 · Date: 14th c. · Evidence: scholarly identification · Status: pinned · private land, no public access; view from the public road
- An Dún (Irish form provisional), Doon: the feast site of 1351: an oval platform about 60 by 50 m above Loch na nÉigeas, identified by FitzPatrick's 2016 field survey; later the site of a castle (1574) and of Doon House.Reference: FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned (2023), pp. 147–149 · Date: 1351 (feast); castle 1574 · Evidence: scholarly identification · Status: pinned: 1351 feast site · private land, no public access; view from the public road
- Baile Uí Dhubhagáin, Ballydoogan, and Cartrún Uí Dhubhagáin, Cartrondoogan: lands of the Ó Dubhagáin, the learned family of the court.Reference: FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned (2023), pp. 147–149 · Date: townland names · Evidence: later source (scholarly study) · Status: pinned
- Baile na Banaba, Ballynabanaba: where the Book of Lecan places Ó Longargáin, the lord's harper, near his patron.Reference: Book of Lecan, via FitzPatrick · Date: c. 1400 (Lecan) · Evidence: contemporary record (as cited) · Status: Irish form checked: Baile na Banaba; coordinates approximate · private land, no public access; view from the public road
- Loch na nÉigeas (Boggaun Lough): "the lake of the poets", a seasonal lake south-west of Doon Fort, the feast site, that keeps the memory of the learned in the landscape.Reference: FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned (2023), pp. 147–149; Knott, Ériu 5, 60–61 · Date: — · Evidence: later source (scholarly study) · Status: identified (south-west of Doon Fort); map position approximate
Sources: Elizabeth FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned; Book of Lecan as cited there; Tony O'Gorman, A History of Fohenagh.
Bealach na bhFilí · The poets' route (as told locally)
Local tradition tells how the poets came: west out of Ballinasloe along the Eiscir Riada, the great esker road, with the Turoe Stone away to the south-west on their left. At Kilconnell they turned north by Callow Lough, and came to Doon Fort above Loch na nÉigeas, the feast hall, close to the lord's court at An Lios Mór, Pallas, in Fohenagh. You can follow a reconstruction on the time map (Routes layer).
Route as told locally (Garry Lohan, following FitzPatrick for the court site), reconstructed from maps; Gallagh (Castle Blakeney) is a nearby court site and is not on the route; photos from Garry Lohan to come.
Compare: Cathair Mhic Neachtain, Cahermacnaghten
In the Burren, Co. Clare, the stone cashel of Cahermacnaghten was home to the Uí Dhábhoireann (O'Davorens), a family of lawyers who ran a law school there. It shows what a learned family's place looked like: a walled homestead, a house for the master, room for students, and good land granted by the lord in return for their skill. The harpers and poets around Pallas would have lived on similar terms, close to their patron and honoured for their art.
Source: FitzPatrick, Landscapes of the Learned (comparison, in our own words).
From the court to the hurling field
Hurling was already part of Gaelic life when the poets feasted here. Follow the story of the game, and Fohenagh's own hurlers, on HurlingWiki.
This site focuses on Gaelic Uí Mhaine and leaves the colonial story (for example the 1366 Statutes of Kilkenny) to other sources.
Credits
With thanks to the scholarship of Elizabeth FitzPatrick (Landscapes of the Learned, Oxford University Press, 2023), D.P. Curley (A multi-disciplinary study of lordly centres in the later medieval Uí Chellaig lordship of Uí Maine, c.1100–1600 AD, PhD thesis, University of Galway, 2022) and Tony O'Gorman (A History of Fohenagh). Everything here is written in our own words; no pages or images from these works are reproduced.