School: Sean-cheann tSáile (roll number 9649)

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   “Over twenty eight hundred years ago...”

   

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   Over twenty eight hunded years ago the Old Head of Kinsale was the site of the royal palace of the Iberian king of Southern Ireland. His name was Cearmna. After reigning for forty years he was slain in battle by his cousin Blue Spear.

   Dun Cearmna as the Old Head was then called was a royal fort of the Gael for seventeen centuries. Ossian's grandmother was born there by some accounts.

   It appears that the Norsemen occupied it too and they called it Olderness from which the name Old Head is derived.

   On the site of Cearmna's dun, Myles de Courcey built a castle in 1223. In the same year Myles was created Baron Kingsale the second oldest title in the peerage. The castle was named Dun Mac Patrick. In 1587 Baron Kingsale of that time who was a descendant of Myles de Courceys, gave the castle to Florence Mac Carthy, the greatest chief in Munster. In 1600 the English soldiers from Kinsale seized the castle and imprisoned Florence in London, where he died forty years later.
   
   In 1647 the State had possession of the castle which had been used a beacon warning against the Moors. About 1748 the castle was deserted and was afterwards made a ruin of by French

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   Transcribed by a member of our volunteer transcription project.

   History Edit

   Topics

   1. objects
      1. man-made structures
         1. historical and commemorative structures (~6,794)

   Language

   English

   Collector

   Mairéad Ní Dhíomasaigh

   Gender

   Female

   Age

   13

   Address

   Kinsale, Co. Cork

   Informant

   Séamus P. O Éalaidhthe

   Address

   Kinsale, Co. Cork