Matheson Collection > Gleanings from Irish manuscripts

ELEGY ON ÉMONN O BRAONAIN
The following poem is edited from a manuscript
in the Franciscan Convent, Merchants* Quay,
Dublin, which is marked A. 14, and of which some
account has been given by Father Dinneen in his
edition of the Forus Feasa of Céitinn, vol. viii,
Irish Texts Society, p. xxxi. With the exception
of some lines the poem is very accurately copied.
A few misspellings have been rectified below.
The family of O Braonáin ' O Brennan ' to
which Emonn Braonáin, the subject of our poem
belonged, was descended from Enna, son of Niall
of the Nine Hostages. The Laud Genealogies,
printed by Kuno Meyer, Zeitschrift fur Celtische
Philologie viii, 291 ff, enumerate no less than
fourteen sons of Niall, and the descendants of at
least four of these, were settled within the limits of
the modern county Westmeath. Enna a quo Cenél
nEnnae, says the genealogist : O Flaherty gives
further particulars thus : Ennius Fionn natu
iunior cuius stirps olim in Tirenda Tirconalliae,
regione inter duo maris brachia^ nempe inter
sinutn Lochfewail et Suilech sinum, et O Broenain
in Kinelenda prope Uisneach collem in Kinelfiachia^
Ogygia 401. The ancestor of the Ui Braonáin
is referred to by our poet twice, stanzas 1 1
and 28. According to O Dubhagáin as cited by
Lynch, Cambrensis Eversus^ i. 238, the family
of Mag Ruairc belonged to the same race. The
name of O Braonáin is still common in the parish
of Castletown, which lies a few miles to the south