Cenél nÓengusa
Encyclopedia
Islay
-Prehistory:The earliest settlers on Islay were nomadic hunter-gatherers who arrived during the Mesolithic period after the retreat of the Pleistocene ice caps. In 1993 a flint arrowhead was found in a field near Bridgend dating from 10,800 BC, the earliest evidence of a human presence found so far...
, and perhaps nearby Colonsay
Colonsay
Colonsay is an island in the Scottish Inner Hebrides, located north of Islay and south of Mull and has an area of . It is the ancestral home of Clan Macfie and the Colonsay branch of Clan MacNeill. Aligned on a south-west to north-east axis, it measures in length and reaches at its widest...
, off the western coast of Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
in the early Middle Ages.
The Senchus fer n-Alban
Senchus fer n-Alban
The Senchus Fer n-Alban is an Old Irish medieval text, believed to have been compiled in the 10th century. It may have been derived from earlier documents of the 7th century which are presumed to have been written in Latin...
, a census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
and genealogy
Genealogy
Genealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigrees of its members...
of the kingdom of Dál Riata
Dál Riata
Dál Riata was a Gaelic overkingdom on the western coast of Scotland with some territory on the northeast coast of Ireland...
, lists the Cenél nÓengusa as one of the three kin groups making up the kingdom in Argyll
Argyll
Argyll , archaically Argyle , is a region of western Scotland corresponding with most of the part of ancient Dál Riata that was located on the island of Great Britain, and in a historical context can be used to mean the entire western coast between the Mull of Kintyre and Cape Wrath...
. The others were the Cenél nGabráin of Kintyre
Kintyre
Kintyre is a peninsula in western Scotland, in the southwest of Argyll and Bute. The region stretches approximately 30 miles , from the Mull of Kintyre in the south, to East Loch Tarbert in the north...
and the Cenél Loairn of Lorn
Lorn
Lorn may refer to:* John Lorn McDougall , Ontario businessman and political figure* John Lorn McDougall, Sr. , businessman and political figure in Canada West* Lorn, New South Wales, Australia...
. A fourth group, the Cenél Comgaill, of Cowal
Cowal
thumb|Cowal shown within ArgyllCowal is a peninsula in Argyll and Bute in the Scottish Highlands.-Description:The northern part of Cowal is mostly the mountainous Argyll Forest Park. Cowal is separated from the Kintyre peninsula to the west by Loch Fyne, and from Inverclyde and North Ayrshire to...
and the Isle of Bute
Isle of Bute
Bute is an island in the Firth of Clyde in Scotland. Formerly part of the county of Buteshire, it now constitutes part of the council area of Argyll and Bute. Its resident population was 7,228 in April 2001.-Geography:...
, later split from the Cenél nGabráin. The Senchus portrays Dál Riata as it existed in the mid-seventh century.
The Senchus traces the descent of the Cenél nÓengusa from Óengus Mór mac Eirc, brother of Fergus Mór
Fergus Mór
Fergus Mór mac Eirc was a legendary king of Dál Riata. He was the son of Erc.While his historicity may be debatable, his posthumous importance as the founder of Scotland in the national myth of Medieval and Renaissance Scotland is not in doubt...
, a relationship which is almost certainly an invention. The Cenél nÓengusa are the only kindred from which no historical kings of Dál Riata are recorded by the Irish annals
Irish annals
A number of Irish annals were compiled up to and shortly after the end of Gaelic Ireland in the 17th century.Annals were originally a means by which monks determined the yearly chronology of feast days...
.
Óengus Mór is said to have had two sons, Nadsluaig and Fergna, and their descendants are listed in the Senchus. It also lists the subdivisions of Islay, and the number of houses in each. The Cenél nÓengusa are listed among these, and thirty households only are attributed to them. As well as the descendants of Óengus, the Senchus places the Cenél Conchride, named for Conchriath, son of Bolc, son of Sétna, son of Fergus Bec, son of Erc, on Islay.
It has been suggested that Fergna son of Óengus Mór may be identified with Fergnae mac Oengusso Ibdaig
Fergnae mac Oengusso Ibdaig
Fergnae mac Óengusso Ibdaig was a Dal Fiatach king of Ulaid. He was the nephew of Muiredach Muinderg mac Forgo and grandson of Forga mac Dallán, previous kings....
, that is Fergnae son of Óengus the Hebridean. The descendants of this Fergnae, known as the Uí Ibdaig—the descendants of the Hebridean—were counted as a minor branch of the powerful Dál Fiatach
Dál Fiatach
The Dál Fiatach were a group of related dynasties located in eastern Ulster in the Early Christian and Early Medieval periods of the history of Ireland.-Description:...
of Ulster.
The Senchus states that the Cenél nÓengusa ruled over four hundred and thirty households, and that they were obliged to provide the overking of Dál Riata with two seven-bench ships for each twenty households on sea expeditions, and with five hundred fighting men on land expeditions.
Marjorie Ogilvie Anderson
Marjorie Ogilvie Anderson was a Scottish historian and paleographer. Born Marjorie Ogilvie Cunningham in St Andrews, she attended St Leonard's School there before studying English at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University....
suggested that this genealogy dates from the early 8th century, as do those given for the other kindreds in the same source, and reflects a second census undertaken at about that time.
There are very few historical sources outwith the Senchus which refer to the Cenél nÓengusa. The late Tripartite Life of Saint Patrick
Saint Patrick
Saint Patrick was a Romano-Briton and Christian missionary, who is the most generally recognized patron saint of Ireland or the Apostle of Ireland, although Brigid of Kildare and Colmcille are also formally patron saints....
refers to Patrick appointing a certain Ném as bishop of Telach in the lands of the Cenél nÓengusa. Adomnán's hagiography
Hagiography
Hagiography is the study of saints.From the Greek and , it refers literally to writings on the subject of such holy people, and specifically to the biographies of saints and ecclesiastical leaders. The term hagiology, the study of hagiography, is also current in English, though less common...
of Columba
Columba
Saint Columba —also known as Colum Cille , Colm Cille , Calum Cille and Kolban or Kolbjørn —was a Gaelic Irish missionary monk who propagated Christianity among the Picts during the Early Medieval Period...
mentions a rich Islay landowner named Feradach, but says nothing about the political background on the island.