This name is Gaelic is Ó Daimhín and
the ancestor who gave the sept its name was Daimhín,
died 966, the son of Cairbre Dam Argait, King of
Oriel. A brother of Daimhín called Cormac was
ancestor of the Maguires and the O'Devines, Lords of
Tirkennedy. It was a leading Co. Fermanagh sept up
until and including the fifteenth century. Later,
the power of the leading family was broken by pressure
from the O'Neills in the north and the Maguires in the
south. However, the name is still known in
Fermanagh, although more common in counties Tyrone and
Derry. The name stems from the word damh, meaning
'ox', and not from dámh, meaning 'poet'. The sept
gave Clogher in Co. Tyrone its original name, Clochar Mac
nDaimhín.GLOSSARY
| Clan |
From the Gaelic
clann which means literally 'children'. |
| Mac- |
From the Gaelic
mac, meaning 'son' |
| O' |
From the Gaelic
Ó, meaning 'grandson', 'grandchild' or
'descendant'; Ní is the femine form of Ó,
meaning 'daughter' or 'descendant' |
| Plantation (Ulster) |
The
redistribution of escheated lands after the
defeat of the Ulster Gaelic lords and the 'Flight
of the Earls' in 1607. Only counties
Donegal, Derry, Tyrone, Armagh, Fermanagh and
Cavan were actually 'planted', portions of land
there being distributed to English and Scottish
families on their lands and for the building of
bawns. |
| Sept |
A family group of
shared ancestry living in the same locality |
| Undertakers |
Powerful English
or Scottish landowners who undertook the
plantation of British settlers on the lands they
were granted. |
| Gaelic |
This word in
Ireland has no relation to Scotland. As a
noun it is used to denote the Irish language, as
an adjective to denote native Irish as opposed to
Norman or English origin. |
| Erenagh |
From the Irish
Gaelic airchinneach, meaning 'hereditary steward
of church lands'. A family would hold the
ecclesiastical office and the right to the church
or monastery lands, the incumbent at any one time
being the erenagh. |
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