Diarmuid Mac Muireadhaigh
Diarmuid Mac Muireadhaigh, Irish poet, alive late 17th century.
Biography
Mac Muireadhaigh is believed to be the composer of a twenty-three verse poem in honor of Górdún Ó Neill, Gluaisigh ribh a ghlac rannsa ... Paul Walsh (priest) notes that "Our poem would seem to have been addressed to him before the stirring times of his last years in Ireland," meaning it was written for Ó Neill sometime in the 1680s.
No other details of Mac Muireadhaigh appear to be known, although a man of his surname was killed in action at the Battle of Aughrim in 1691, and was grandfather of Séamus Mór Mac Mhurchaidh, poet and outlaw, who was executed in 1750.
Górdún Ó Neill was a son of Felim O'Neill of Kinard.
The Poem
The first four verses of the poem -
- Gluaisigh ribh a ghlac rannsa
- (ná fuirghe a bfad agamsa)
- go hO Néill na ngruadh ngarrtha
- do féin sdual gach deaghtarrtha
- Abruidh uaim re a fholt tais
- gur end sibh don chrann iomhais
- do bhean me (sa taoibh re tuinn)
- don chraoibh go ngé ^ núir náluinn
- Innsigh dhósan do shúr suilt
- doighre Cuind et Cormuic
- go bfuil im sdórsa lámh libh
- lán cóffra dona cnóaibh
- Mac Sir Féidhlim flaith Eamhna
- gion go labhair Gaoidhealga X.
- do dhéin gáire gléghlan ruibh
- ní náire dhó féin bhar bféuchuin
Translation
The first four verses translated -
- Go, ye handful of verses — stay not long
- with me — to Néill of the fine cheeks,
- to him everything good is due.
- Say to his soft hair, from me, that ye are a
- nut from the tree which I plucked — its side
- was towards the ground — from the branch
- with fresh beautiful appearance.
- Tell him, to excite mirth, Conn*s and
- Cormac's heir, that in my store with ye
- there is a cofferful.
- Sir Féidhlim's son, Emhain's prince,
- though he speaks not Irish, shall bestow
- on ye a clear-bright laugh, no shame for
- him it is to look upon ye.