THE UI-BRIUIN OF BREIFNI

 (UI-BRIUIN   BRIANS DESCENDANTS)
(from the Ui-Briuin Genealogies)

Cormac MacAirt and his house relied mainly on Connacht (or Connaught as it is spelled now) in their times of peril and when in distress turned always to Connacht as their safest refuge.  Connacht roughly comprised the present counties of Mayo, Sligo, Leitrim, Galway and Roscommon. Eventually, Cormac’s great-grandson, Muiredach Tirech (Muiredach The Land Grabberr) assumed the kingship of Connacht and transmitted that dignity to his son Eochaid Muighieadhon (spelled in a variety of ways). Muighmeadhon, King of Ireland from 399 to 405 A.D. is the line from which the McGoverns came.  He was also an expert Druid. In Connacht, the prolific progeny of Eochaidh Muighmeadhon had to be accommodated with lands in their own right…. and for the princelings of every generation new confiscations had to be made until the lordships carved out practically the whole of Coiced Olnegiact… .(Connacht).

Eochaidh Muighieadon’s spouse was Mongfill, a princess of the house of Eoghan Nor, and by her Eochaidh begot four sons: Brian, Fiachra, Ailill and Fergus.  From Brian, the eldest of the family descended the various stocks of Ui Briuin, including the McGoverns.

 But to Eochaidh another, and still younger son, was born by Cairrenn Casdubh, a bondmaid of royal parentage whom he had brought as a captive from one of his raids to Britain. He was described as 'yellow as standard gold refined was the splendor of the noble 1ocks of Nial Mac-Eachdach.

Niall, the golden-haired youth subsequently surpassed all his forefathers in renown…and  at Tara he received hostages from the five subordinate kings of Ireland--as well as from the four tributary kings of Alba.  (Alba was a kingdom set up in what is now Scotland by Irish raiders and one of its kings was a McGovern about whom we will hear later.)

Brian, being the first-born of the family should have inherited the crown of Tara. But Niall's dashing qualities and commanding personality so captivated his father and the nobles of Ireland that overlooking his baseness of his birth and immaturity of years they chose him High Prince.

Magnanimous by nature, Niall, on attaining the kingship made Brian his chief legate in war and delegated to him the Kingship of Connacht. But Fiachra, and his son, Nathi or Dathi, smitten with jealousy because of this preferment of Niall, rose up against Brian and he fell in a battle near Headford in County Galway.

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