Ímar Ua Donnubáin

Ivor's (former) territory.

Ímar Ua Donnubáin or Ivor O'Donovan, and possibly nicknamed Gilla Riabach,^[1] was a legendary and celebrated petty king, navigator, trader, and reputed necromancer of 13th century Ireland belonging to the O'Donovan family. He may or may not have been the second son of Cathal, son of Crom Ua Donnubáin, from whom the modern Clancahill dynasty descend. In any case Ivor is the ancestor of the historical O'Donovan sept known as the Sliocht Íomhair or "Seed of Ivor", who are generally considered to have been one of the four great septs of the family before being all but destroyed in the 1560s in a conflict with the Clancahill main line. Although mostly legendary, Ivor is possibly referred to in one or two near contemporary sources.

His name is the Gaelic for the Norse Ivar, and his associations are principally maritime. The O'Donovan family of the 10th, 11th, 12th, and early 13th centuries were associated with the world of the Norse-Gaels, although they lived in a region of Ireland distant from the great centres of that culture in the Irish Sea region. Ímar was a descendant and likely namesake of Ivar of Limerick and/or Ivar of Waterford through Cathal, son of Donnubán mac Cathail, who established friendly relations with the Norse of Limerick city and distant Waterford for himself and his descendants. Between the late 12th and early 13th centuries the majority of the family were forced to relocate to distant Carbery on the southern shores of Munster, and they early established themselves as absolute masters of the celebrated bay and harbour of Glandore, capturing it from the Normans. It is with this harbour and its environs that Ivor is exclusively associated.

Enchanted ship

The most well known description of Ivor and his enchanted ship comes from the poet John Collins of Myross:

According to John O'Donovan this occurred right after the death of Daniel V O'Donovan, Lord of Clancahill and descendant of Donal of the Hides, who was to nearly annihilate the Sliocht Íomhair and dispossess the remainder from their lands probably in the 1560s.^[2][3] Lough Cluhir means Sheltered Lake.

A longer account was fortunately preserved by Edith Anna Somerville, a native of the area,^[4] in the late 19th or early 20th century, who visited a local storyteller or seanchaí living by the lake. According to him^[5]

Hounds

Ivor also keeps Irish wolfhounds. According to the Storyteller

There is also a Black Hound in the lake. According to the Storyteller^[6]

The Serpent and the Burkes

The Seanchaí goes on to tell Somerville the story of the Serpent once inhabiting Lough Cluhir, when Ivor was still living. Apparently it caused considerable destruction and would jump out to grab anything or anyone who got within five feet of the water. One day, however...

Burke's preparations are described: the carving of a spear of mountain ash and forging of a grapple to fasten to it, then the picking of a spot for the battle, and finally the choosing of the finest of O'Donovan's three swords, the first two of which break when tested. "O'Donovan and his crowd, and all the Gentry" have arrived, and Burke has instructed his younger brother to hold the "spar" at the edge of the lake.

The Serpent has her head and neck cut off, and proceeds to swim madly about the now bloody lake, eventually sinking down to the bottom dead. The "Keeraun Spar" is found sticking out of the water from her body the next morning.

Ivor then holds a three-day-long feast for the Burkes "up at Liss Blaw on the hill above",^[7] and gives them lands or perhaps even a lordship in the area.

Clíodhna

Curiously, the ancient goddess of South Munster, Clíodhna (Cleena), has beneath Lough Cluhir one of her several palaces in the country, according to the Storyteller. The story he tells involves the wife of a peasant working for Burke Far-Shoung and does not involve Ivor himself,^[8] but it is in fact the case that the O'Donovans are one of those noble families long associated with the Goddess. Whatever arrangements Cleena and Ivor might have are not discussed, but approaching four centuries later one of his collateral descendants, the formidable Donal III O'Donovan, is called the Dragon of Clíodhna in a Gaelic praise poem celebrating his accession to the lordship of Clancahill in 1639. In Munster she is most famously associated with Glandore and its environs, the western half of which were controlled by Ivor and his descendants for nearly three centuries,^[9] and so some association was certainly inevitable.

Seed of Ivor

The Annals of Innisfallen report that in the year 1282 "The son of Gilla Riabach Ó Donnubáin was slain by Gilla Mo-Chudu, son of in Dubshúilech Ó Súilliubáin."^[10] However it is not certain that this actually refers to a son of Ivor, and it is possible Gilla Riabach was originally a separate member of the family, although an alternative is of course that Ivor was actually his son and may be the very person mentioned being slain by the O'Sullivans, whom the O'Donovans engaged in minor warfare or back and forth raiding on occasion. In his Leabhar na nGenealach, Duald Mac Firbis is careful to mention that both Tadhg, Cathal's other son, and Gilla Riabach held the overlordship of the family,^[11] which included a decentralised (as a result of the Norman invasion of Ireland) but not inconsiderable petty kingdom underneath the broad overlordship of the MacCarthy dynasty in that time,^[12] and so dependent on a positive association of Ivor with Gilla Riabach in some manner, this could be taken as evidence of the status the Sliocht Íomhair once held. Collins of Myross is the first now known to have identified them.

In 1295 another more likely son of Ivor may have been Máol Íosa mac Íomhair, who apparently trespassed onto Norman held lands along with Cathal, his grandfather according to tradition, and with Cathal's brother Lochlann, according to Norman documents.^[13] For this the trio were in any case pardoned, but no more is heard of Máol Íosa.

1560

The activities of the O'Donovan family and its various septs are poorly documented in the 14th and 15th centuries. Coverage of Munster affairs in general in the Irish annals is to be found very limited today because of large gaps in the surviving manuscripts and the total loss of many others. Anglo-Norman documents and church records are all that remain to be turned to, and while these preserve the occasional mention of a member of the family, nothing of its structure, political or internal affairs is offered. That the family remained at least locally prominent is proven by their providing a Bishop of Ross in the mid-late 15th century, but it is not until the 16th century that much more information, from a variety of new sources, many of them English, becomes available, and this for the most part belongs to the second half of the century.

The Sliocht Íomhair do in fact appear in late 16th to early 17th century English surveys of the "O'Donovan country", but only as a tiny remnant no longer in possession of their once thought to be considerable lands, with their castle(s) already in ruins. How it came to be that one of the most prominent septs of the family found themselves in this condition was preserved in local tradition and by storytellers, and at least some of this tradition was eventually recorded by Collins of Myross in the late 18th century, going as follows:^[2]

According to tradition, the O'Donovans of Clann Cathail (Clancahill), regarded to be the senior or leading sept of the greater family, had for some decades in the early-mid 16th century been involved in a violent succession dispute in which the rivalling branches had already assassinated a number of their kin on each side. The Sliocht Íomhair and their head [An] Íomhar Ó Donnabháin were the leading supporters of the branch which by 1560 appeared to have won, represented by one Diarmaid an Bhairc, whose epithet "of the Barque" means "born at sea" and who presumably had some close association with Ivor's family. The rival and seemingly vanquished branch were now represented by Donal of the Skins, whose father Teige may or may not have been assassinated by his rivals some years before, but who in any event had grown up far to the north among the O'Learys in Muskerry and whose existence was unknown to Diarmaid and his supporters down on the seacoast. Donal however had the support not only of his O'Leary in-laws, but also the Sliocht Aineislis [MacEnesles] O'Donovans, the family of his mother and one itself of the four main septs of the greater family. In addition to the Sliocht Íomhair Diarmaid had the support of the smaller sept of the Sliocht Tioboit [Theobald] O'Donovans.

When the day for Diarmaid's inauguration with the White Wand in Rosscarbery by the MacCarthy Reagh came, Donal, the Sliocht Aineislis and the O'Learys surprised the other party in the town and its environs, and according to tradition...^[2]

Of primary importance is the precise lineage of Diarmaid an Bhairc, whose associations, like the Sliocht Íomhair, are maritime. The surviving pedigrees do not preserve his lineage and Collins only reports him belonging to a "collateral branch" of Clancahill.^[14] The reasons for the Sliocht Íomhair's involvement and support of him are also not preserved, and so noting their ancestor Ímar's central importance in the beliefs of the greater family, a variety of explanations have been suggested. The one with the strongest support, entertained by John O'Donovan and his followers, is that what Collins found himself reporting was simply the garbled memory of a war between Clann Cathail and the Sliocht Íomhair, who importantly were regarded as a "collateral branch" themselves of the former.^[15]

Modern?

According to Richard Cronnelly in his synthetic pedigree of the O'Donovans, "The O'Donovans Daill of the parish of Kilmeen descended from Ire [Ivor].",^[16] referring to the head of the family slain in 1560. The often numerous septs of Gaelic, Norse-Gaelic and Hiberno-Norman families were commonly distinguished from one another by various terms, often colour, e.g. Donn (dark) or Rua (red), but in this case the adjective Daill means blind. It is unknown if Cronnelly's use of the past tense is meant to mean that the family were no longer in existence by the time he was published in 1864.

Castle Ivor

The ruins of Ivar's castle, now called Castle Ivor, Castle Ire, and Castle Eyre, can be found close to the small village of Union Hall, County Cork. According to John Collins it was built in 1251. The remaining fragment is only a portion of the north and west walls, but still prominent when viewed from the area of Lough Cluhir. It was probably a watch tower in purpose, with its position described by Dr. Daniel Donovan:^[17]

See also

• Ship burial
• Psychopomp
• Uí Ímair

Notes

References