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Daingean Breac/Brack

This story was told to Mary O’Loughlin from Creevagh, Quin by James Meaney also from Creevagh ,Quin,Co Clare.

There was a man living in the County of Limerick and he dreamt he got money in a castle.He came to the Fair of Quin, and he was looking over at Danganbrack Castle and he said it was like the castle he dreamt of. He went over to the castle and he told the woman that was living there that he dreamt he got gold and he showed her the place in the wall. She told him to go back to Mass and to come over again. When he was gone she told her husband and he rooted into the wall and got a haul of gold. When the man came back she told him that they looked for the gold and got nothing.

Daingean Breac [Danganbrack] is a large square building with four gables and chimneys within two fields of Quin Abbey and about a mile north west of Baile Uí Mharcacháin. It belonged to the MacNamaras and remains in good preservation and, though part of the roof has fallen in, it is still inhabited. It is seven miles north-west of Six Mile Bridge.

 

Besides the castles of Knopouge and Fergus before mentioned, there are the remains of the castles of Ballymarkahan, Dangan, and Danganbrack. Dangan castle is said to be one of the oldest in Munster, having been built by Philip de Clare, from whom the county of Thomond has since been called Clare. It was with other possessions granted by Chas. II. to Pierse Creagh for his services against Cromwell, and still remains in the possession of the descendants of the original grantee. It was formerly a place of some strength, and was of a quadrangular form, flanked at each angle by a small round tower : from the centre rose the donjon or keep. The ruins form a picturesque object in the well-planted demesne of Dangan. The castle of Danganbrack is now in the Scott family, having, with Knopouge, been purchased from the Macnamaras, as Moriesk has more recently been by the father of Lord Fitzgerald and Vesci.

County Clare: A History and Topography 1837 by Samuel Lewis

Dangan Castle
O.S. No. 133. Long. 8º48´.W. Lat. 52º50´.N.
Of this once large and important castle on a small part remains, and that is not easily visible through the great growth of ivy and bushes which occupies the site. In Lewis’ Topographical Dictionary it is stated that the castle was built by Philip de Clare, and was quadrangular with a round turret at each corner and a keep in the middle.

It would not now, however, be recognized from this description, for only one of the turrets or bastions remains visible, and the keep is a later structure built on the west side, partly outside the original building line, and apparently occupying the site of the south-west bastion. The quadrangular enclosure seems to have been about 100 feet square, but the east wall is entirely demolished, and the south wall has been altered at different times, and what remains of it are much obstructed by fallen stones, so that it is hard to trace the exact plan. On the south-west is a square tower, 50 ft. by 40 ft. (though the south wall has fallen) and originally apparently of three or more storeys in height. It is divided into two parts by a transverse wall running north and south, each half covered with a pointed barrel vault over the first floor. A newel staircase occupied the south-west corner. In the north wall is a window of fifteenth century character.

To the south-east, and apparently largely outside the original line of wall, a large hall was built, the only remaining features of which shew work apparently of the sixteenth century. It measures 50 ft. by 30 ft.

In the north wall was a large window of which the internal splays and round rear arch remain, carefully worked in ashlar masonry. On the east wall appears a weather mold, marking the lower roof of buildings which formerly stood on the south side of the court.

The whole structure is very ruinous and covered with ivy.

Danganbrack Castle
O.S. No. 133. Long. 8º51´.W. Lat. 52º49´.N.
The building is a small square castle of the type known as “Peel Towers,” and is typical of nine-tenths of the castles in Ireland. They were all built in the fifteenth or sixteenth centuries; they all used to be attributed to the English of the Elizabethan invasion, but they seem to have been so soon in the hands of the native chiefs that this proposition cannot be unreservedly accepted. They are of small size but great height, with a small door, and all but the highest storey covered by barrel vaults.

Danganbrack (a name which is explained locally as “because it was a great place for trout”) belonged in 1580 to John MacNamara.[4] The bartizans at the top corners, and the high gables and chimneys added in the late sixteenth century give it a more picturesque air than most of the type. Like all of them, the planning is somewhat complex, the passages and stairs being contrived so as to be easily defensible in case the lower storey was stormed. On the south-west and north-east corners square bartizans are carried on long pointed corbels; on the south-east this feature is round on plan, and the corbels project in successive courses, the undersides of the stones rounded. The north-west corner is plain.

The building was inhabited in comparatively recent times, and the original small windows in the lower storeys have been destroyed: on the top floor, which was the principal hall in the castle, the larger windows have only been slightly altered at the time the gables were raised; plain square lights replacing the ogee-headed ones which formerly existed.

The fireplaces, on which much art and skill were usually lavished, have with one exception disappeared, and that one is plain in design and much mutilated.

The whole is in substantial repair, except the stairs, which have been broken down to prevent access to the upper floors, and the later work on the top floors which is in rather a shaky condition.

http://www.limerickcity.ie/media/NMAJ%20vol%2053%2010%20Tower%20Houses%20and%20Power%20in%20East%20Clare,%20by%20Andrew%20Tierney.pdf

https://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/archaeology/parish_quin_ua_briain.htm#danganbrack

What did the Anglo Normans ever do for us?

We are well aware of the impact of the Anglo-Norman invasion on our history, the undermining of Gaelic society and the replacement of our native structures. Poor old Diarmuid MacMurrough takes a lot of blame for all of this, despite the fact that Henry II in England had already sought and had been given approval by Pope Adrian to invade and civilise us. Henry was just waiting to finish his war in France before sorting us out!

Anyway, in they came, conquered, settled, married and eventually becoming more Irish than even ourselves, ‘níos gaelaí ná na Gaeil féin’! But besides building towns and castles, robbing our women (and probably taking our jobs!), what did the Anglo-Normans do for us – if anything?

Well, for one, they gave us a whole new suite of names, both forename and surname, to choose from.

The Norman influence on Irish surnames

Following the invasion of 1169, a large number of Anglo-French first and last names entered into Ireland. Many, such as Power, Browne, Fleming, Joyce, Burke, Barry, Costello, Nagle, Nugent, D’arcy, Roche and Walsh/Welsh/Wallace, are nowadays considered Irish and are commonly found in Clare. So, too, are those with the Fitz prefix such as Fitzmaurice, Fitzgerald, Fitzgibbon and Fitzpatrick which most people would regard as Irish as the shamrock. Fitz, meaning ‘son of’, can be considered the Norman version of Mac (it derives from the Latin/French ‘fils de’, meaning ‘son of’). Burke came from de Burgh, Roche from de Roiste, Power from de Paor.

In 1366, a law was passed that “Every Englishman do use the English language, and be named by an English name, leaving off entirely the manner of naming used by the Irish.” This was introduced to dissuade the settlers from adopting Celtic prefixes or forms of surname. It didn’t have much affect as many settler families added Mac or ‘O’ and Norman names evolved into an Irish form (eg McHenry, McArthur).

In 1465 a law was passed enacting “that every Irishman that dwells betwixt or amongst Englishmen in the County of Dublin, Myeth, Vriell, and Kildare … shall take to him an English Surname of one town, as Sutton, Chester, Trym, Skryne, Corke, Kinsale; or colour, as white, blacke, browne; or arte or science, as smith or carpenter; or office, as cooke, butler ….”

Many of the trades of the early medieval period such as Archer, Butler, Cooper, Carpenter, Draper, Skinner, Tanner found their way into our surnames. Other introductions from this period came from the mercenary soldiers who accompanied the Norman invasion: Walsh (meaning Welsh), Joyce and Fleming (from Flemish mercenaries) are examples.

Incidentally, the Normans usually took their surnames from the place of their family origins. So, D’arcy originates in Arcy in Normandy. De Clare originates in Clare in Suffolk where the Anglo-Norman family were based. While De indicated their place of origin, Le was used to describe them, eg Le Poer meant ‘a poor person’.

De Burgh – Burke – from a placename in Suffolk, France

Le Botilier – Butler – Occupation bottle steward

De Barra – Barry – from an estate in Wales

Le Waleys – Walsh – the Welshmen

De Angulo – Costello/Nangle – from Nangle Pembrokeshire

What of their influence on forenames?

 Many of the Normans forenames introduced here were of a biblical or European saintly origin.

 In 1922, Reverend Patrick Woulfe wrote extensively on the topic of Irish name origins as follows:

In the same manner Norman and English names became current in Irish families during the thirteenth and subsequent centuries. These have now almost completely supplanted the old Gaelic names. The names borne by the Normans and by them introduced into Ireland, were of three kinds :

 (1) names of Scandinavian origin which their ancestors had carried with them to Normandy ;

(2) names of Germanic origin which the Frankish conquerors had brought across the Rhine and which had ousted the old Celtic and Latin names from France ; and

(3) Biblical names and Latin and Greek names of saints,, which the Normans began to adopt about the beginning of the eleventh century.

Together with these came in a few Celtic names from Brittany, a small number of Anglo-Saxon names, some Danish and Norse names from England, and one or two British or Welsh names. These were nearly all very rare and most of them soon died out. Of the Anglo-Saxon names, only two, Edmund and Edward, survived. Alfred has been revived in recent times. At the period of the Invasion, Frankish names were by far the most popular among the Normans, but Biblical and saintly names were coming rapidly into favour.

The following is a list, in order of frequency, of the more common names borne by the early Anglo- Norman invaders, the Biblical and saintly names of Latin and Greek origin being printed in italics :

William, Robert, Richard, John, Walter, Roger, Ralph, Adam, Hugh, Henry, Thomas, Nicholas, Gilbert, Geoffrey, Elias, Peter (Piers), Osbert, Reginald, Jordan, Simon, Alan, Stephen, Philip, David, Arnold, Alexander, Laurence, Baldwin, Herbert, Martin, Maurice, Godfrey, Andrew, Alfred, James, Samson, Turstein, Warin, Ailward, Daniel, Edward, Gregory, Bernard, Benedict, Hamon, Matthias, Michael, Gerard, Gervase, Lambert, Wilkin, Patrick, Edmund, Edwin, Hubert, Ivor, Joseph, Oliver, Mark.

 The following in alphabetical order were rare :

 Abraham, Adelard, Ailmer, Antony, Augustine, Brian, Clement, Constantine, Estmund, Eustace, Everard, Gocelin, Isaac, Leonard, Luke, Matthew, Miles, Milo, Odo, Osbern, Osmund, Pagan, Ponce, Randulf, Redmund, Rodulf, Silvester, Turold, Ulf, Vincent.

 The following names only came in, or at least became popular, at a later period :

Bartholomew, Christopher, Francis, Gerald, George, Paul, Roland, Theobald.

 Women’s names among the Normans were nearly all of the Biblical or saintly class:

 Agnes, Alice, Amelina, Anastasia, Annabella, Catherine, Cecily, Christina, Dorothy, Egidia, Eleanor, Evelyn, Frances, Honora, Isabella, Johanna, Matilda, Margaret, Susanna.

 The name Mary does not seem to have come into use in Ireland before the end of the16th century. Brigid only began to be used about the same period.

 

Extracted from ‘Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall’, Patrick Woulfe 1922

Out with the old, in with the new

The Anglo-Normans also brought with them new animal species such as the rabbit and fallow deer, new foods such as wheat, orchard fruits, mutton and farming practices such as hay-making. They introduced us to continental European religious saints and practices of the Roman Church. European religious orders soon followed such as the Franciscans, Augustinians, Cistercians, Dominicans etc. These replaced the structures of the native Irish Christian Church.

Up to then, the Irish natives did not adopt the name of saints as they considered this to be placing themselves on a par with the saint. Such naming convention was reserved for those of higher status in the monasteries. This was circumvented by use of the prefix Maol or Giolla meaning follower or servant. The Normans changed all of that and it was now acceptable to be called Peter, James, Michael, John, Mary, Brigid or Margaret.

Very few of us to this day do not have either a forename or surname that is not of Norman origin. Eventually, arising from the Gaelic Revival in the late 19th century, new Irish language versions of these forenames appeared such as Séan, Seamus, Peadar, Máire, Bríd, Mícheál, Cathal and many more appeared.

The Irish Church did not condemn the practice of slave-trading by the Irish until the invasion by the Anglo-Normans and the encroachment of the Roman Church. The story of Patrick (Patricius, son of a Roman administrator), which was introduced here after the Norman conquest, presents the native Irish as uncivilised pagan slavers who needed to be brought to heel. So the Normans inadvertently gave us our native saint and a forename for a good chunk of our population for generations following.

Out with the new, in with the old

Children are rarely given these European saint names today. Authentic Gaelic forenames are much more popular. We are nevertheless, unlikely to see the demise of the Anglo-Normans surnames that were introduced here. But all of us Mikes, Jimmies, Johnnys, Paddys, Kittys, Cathys, Maggies and Bridies can thank the Normans for what they brought us!