Flawed Pedigree or Irish Charlemagne: The Legacy of Brian Boru

FLAWED PEDIGREE OR IRISH CHARLEMAGNE: THE LEGACY OF BRIAN BORU
By PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

FROM ST PATRICK’S TIME TO the turn of the Millennium, Ireland was dominated by the Uí Néill dynasty. With their power-base in Meath and in Tyrone and Donegal, they effectively dominated the northern half of Ireland for centuries. Their only rivals on the island were based in Cashel. These were the Eóganacht of Munster. A couple of times in the centuries, the Eóganacht would manage to field a champion to rival the Uí Néill, but it did not happen very often. In the early ninth century, this was achieved by Feidlimid mac Crimthainn. Not only was Feidlimid King of Munster; he was also Bishop of Cashel; and he was a monk of the reforming Céle Dé (Slave of God) rule which had its origins in Tallaght in the 800s. Feidlimid was well able to use the secular arm to extend monastic reform. If an abbot proved obstinate, Feidlimid would carry out a raid leading contemporaries to observe that he burned more monasteries than any Norse chief. The presence of Feidlimid in various venues outside Munster at the head of an army was hardly unusual, as he attempted to wrest hegemony from the Uí Néill and almost succeeded. He died in 846.

A century and a half later would bring a more successful challenger from Munster onto a national stage which hardly existed before. One of the sub-kingdoms the Eóganacht maintained were the Déisi in what is now Waterford. Some of these made conquests in East Clare and adopted the moniker the Dál Cais. In 934, Cennétig mac Lorcáin became King of the Dál Cais. The Dál Cais were in the ascendent as their Eóganacht overlords declined. This brought some risk as four of Cennétig’s sons were killed in raids on the Dál Cais from both the Eóganacht and the Uí Néill prior to his own death in 951. But when he died, he was described as king of Thomond. His son Lachtna reigned until he was killed in 953 when he was succeeded by his brother Mathgamain.
Resentful Rivals
Mathgamain mac Cennétig was an extremely able ruler and was aware the kingship of Munster was in his grasp as only one branch of the Eóganachta could rival him. In 964, he occupied Cashel which seriously staked his claim. At this stage, he had allies as far afield as Waterford. Limerick proved a cockpit in the struggle for dominance of Munster and its Norse ruler Ivar was frequently driven out. In 974, Mathgamain was acting as King of Munster, but he had a number of resentful opponents. In 976, he was captured and put to death by his Eóganacht enemy Máel Muad and his allies. He was suceeded by his brother Brian Boruma, known to history as Brian Boru.

Brian’s first target on assuming the kingship of the Dál Cais was the coalition who had killed his brother. The Norse king of Limerick, Ivar was first. Brian killed him with two of his sons in the sanctuary of Inis Scataig (Scattery Island) in 977. Following this, he attacked the Uí Fidgente, an Eóganacht ally based in Co Limerick. In 978, he defeated Máel Muad, killed him and took hostages. At this stage, he consolidated his position in Munster. It would be a mistake to think Brian came from nowhere after his brother’s death. For many years he had been a leading political and martial figure within the Dál Cais and many of the tactics he employed were learned from experience. Brian’s biographer cast him in the light of Alfred the Great of England, fighting Norse here, there and everywhere as a young man. This is unlikely, but there was never any shortage of Norse mercenaries in the forces Brian found himself opposing.
Norse impact
The Norse had made an impact on Ireland in the late tenth century. They were now substantially Christianised and their ports were the centre of trade routes. They minted the first Irish coinage. Irish words for commerce and seafaring are largely derived from Scandinavian languages. Some Irish names betray Viking origin: most people are aware that as Lochlann is the Irish for Scandanavia, O’Loughlin and McLoughlin indicate descent from the Norse or Danes. Less obviously, Doyle is derived from Ua Dubhghaill or “dark foreigner”, as the brown-haired Danes were known (the Norse with the “fionn gall”, the blond foreigner). It is no coincidence that Doyle is most common in Dublin. But consider the name Higgins. In Irish, this is Ó hUiginn. When dealing with a language with neither “v” nor “k” and a people who still turn “ing” into “in’”, it becomes clear that Uiginn disguises the word viking. There are many more. If one were to question the depth of the Christianity of the Irish Norse in Dublin, Limerick and Waterford, one might ask the same question about the rest of Ireland or indeed the bulk of Christian Europe. The absorption of the Gospel was a very slow process. Slavery, plurality of wives among the nobility, and other horrors endured a long time. Pre-feudal western Europe was a warrior society barely aspiring to the civilisation of Byzantium. But the Norse left their mark on Ireland. Even without Norse troops, Norse armour and weaponry were adopted. Brian Boru was quite adept at using a naval arm in a lot of his campaigns, often attacking his enemies by land and sea simultaneously. He learned this from the Vikings.

In 982, Brian moved against the Osraige. This corresponds with the present-day Ossory diocese and if considered part of Leinster now, it was in the Munster sphere of influence in the first millennium. As Leinster emerged as a power in its own right late in this era, the buffer kingdom of Osraige wavered between Munster and Leinster. Brian sought to subordinate it to Munster with success that was clear enough to create conflict with the King of Tara, Máel Sechnaill II. The Uí Néill king invaded Clare, but this was no deterrant to Brian who sent a fleet up the Shannon the following year to attack Connaught. He then allied with the Norse of Waterford to attack Dublin and Leinster. Once again, Brian employed a coordinated amphibious attack against his enemies.  This time he invaded Meath in a direct challenge to Máel Sechnaill.

If Brian was going to challenge to the Uí Néill king, he would have to ensure his own position in Munster and in the late 980s, he did just that. He defeated his Déisi kinsmen and took hostages from Lismore, Emly and Cork. Once again, he sailed up the Shannon, attacking Meath and Connaught, though the detachment in Connaught was defeated. Máel Sechnaill invaded Munster, but in 997 he recognised Brian’s dominance over the southern half of Ireland.  At this stage, Leinster was conceded to the Munster sphere of influence. Leinster rebelled, but Máel Morda was captured and the Hiberno-Norse king of Dublin, Sitric was exiled. Both were forced to submit to Brian who was now challenging the King of Tara. Máel Sechnaill found a way to counter one of Brian’s favourite tactics: allying with Connaught, he bridged the Shannon making navigation difficult. But the following year, Brian defeated Meath and Connaught.
Emperor of the Irish
In 1005, Brian moved against Ulster. It should be remembered that Brian was a politician as well as a soldier and would take a diplomatic solution where possible. Leaving a donation of twenty ounces of gold in Armagh and recognising the Church of Armagh as the primatial see was an example of this. Brian was probably illiterate; most kings were. So his secretary signed the Book of Armagh for him. Brian was Imperator Scotorum, literally “Emperor of the Scots”, but the Latin Scotus is more accurately translated as “Gael”, and the Gael of Dál Riada had yet to give their name to Scotland, so the title is understood as Emperor of the Irish. Brian thus disclosed his admiration for Charlemagne (and his brass neck). The Church in Armagh were not indifferent to his endeavours as a more centralised kingdom along the lines of the Carolignian empire or Anglo-Saxon England was a logic that appealed to them. The administrative framework of centralisation would make things easier for the Church. The person of Brian Boru was another matter. The monks at Cashel very obligingly furnished him with a noble lineage going back to the legendary Eógain Mór who founded the Eóganachta.  Of course, the abbot of Cashel was himself an Eóganacht with strong feelings about a Dál Cais parvenu masquerading as something he was not, so he retained Brian’s authentic genealogy. Which goes to show that the politics of a flawed pedigree has a long history.

One after the other, Brian subdued the three Ulster kingdoms of the Ulaid, the Cenél Eógain and in 1011, the Cenél Conaill. At this stage, he was the undisputed High King, or in his own words, Emperor, of the Irish. One might ask what this meant. He certainly was not the effective ruler of Ireland. But he did, as an outsider, manage to gain what the Uí Néill dynasts claimed in principle for centuries, but never put into practice. He created the concept of the kingship of Ireland and showed how this could be gained and maintained. He was not an heroic figure, least of all for royalist legitimists among us. He was able, ruthless, cunning, ambitious and he thought strategically.  He exploited the divisions of his enemies. He understood the politics of the Irish Church and used it to his advantage: Armagh appreciated this was in its own interest. His horizons were much wider than the island of Ireland, as seen in the policies he employed. It is inevitable that a man like Brian will raise resentment, and this came from Leinster and Dublin in 1013. Sitric sought reinforcements from Man and the Isles and Brian assembled a coalition to counter them. Initially Brian had the numeric advantage, but a disagreement with Máel Sechnall evened the sides. They met at Clontarf on 23 April 1014, which was Good Friday that year. Irishmen and Norse fought on both sides. The main protagonists were all dead at the end of the day and Brian’s dream of a centralised Irish monarchy survived only as an idea thereafter, itself leading to more wars through the eleventh and twelfth centuries. But the possibility of an effective national kingdom died at Clontarf.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 131, March-April 2014