Corca Laidhe DNA Project- Background

Background

The Corca Laidhe were a medieval clan in the south west of Ireland.  The documents regarding the clan are not always self consistent and/or complete. The material has proven to be difficult to organize into a diagram and it is easy to get confused with so many names being the same from one generation to another or the same name being spelled slightly different. The diagram shows via gray lines some alternate pedigrees that can be picked out of the documents. Nevertheless, no matter the interpretation the general conclusion is the same, i.e. there once was and maybe now are persons named Driscoll, Coffey, Flynn, Leary, Barry and Clancy who share a common ancestor circa 200 AD.

Many families of the Corca Laidhe are referred to as hereditary proprietors. According to Webster's dictionary a proprietor is a person who has the legal right or exclusive title to something. In the present context that something would be land and the attendant income. A hereditary proprietor could originate as a cadet line (2d son, 3rd son, etc.), a son-in-law or reward for loyalty or service rendered. In some cases the listing of proprietors may simply be a record of land owners. There is good reason to expect the Corca Laidhe genealogy to involve multiple haplogroups and clades.

The genealogy of the Corca Laidhe is described by John O'Donovan in his treatise published in 1849 by the Celtic Society in the book Miscellany of the Celtic Society. He described his treatise as "various readings" from the Book of Ballymote as compared with the Book of Lecan, two books complied about 1400 from various other manuscripts. In addition a transcribed copy of the book is available thanks to a project at the University College Cork know as CELT, the Corpus of Electronic Texts. Another important source is the Book of Glendalough, otherwise known as Genealogies from Rawlinson B 502, which dates from 1130; therein one finds the Genelach Sil Lugdach Meic Itha. An O'Leary pedigree can be found in The O'Clery Book of Genealogies written in the 1600s. These books are all online, click the titles.

One purpose of this project is to build a database for names found in O'Donovan's treatise on the Corca Laidhe. Another is to critically examine the genealogy in light of the resultant data. Lastly, the data is made available to other investigators and family historians for analysis as may suit their purpose.

Membership Requirements

• An appropriate surname
• A minimum of 37 markers tested
• Most distant paternal ancestor specified

Project Forums

Both a Yahoo group and a Rootsweb mail list serve to support this project, click the respective links. Here members may interact with one another via discussion of topics such as the genealogy and history of the Corca Laihdhe or interpretation of the DNA results. On the Yahoo group files and photos may be uploaded for sharing with group.

Surname List

This table tracks names that have been added to the project and their source. The column labeled Pedigree includes fragments that appear relevant.

• Miscellany of the Celtic Society
  • 0. History of the Race of Lughaidh, Son of Ith.
  • 1. Genealogy of Corca Laidhe here first
  • 2. The Hereditary Proprietors of Corca-Laidhe
  • 3. The Mearings of the Middle Cantred
  • 4. Of the genealogy of the Race of Aenghus Bulga
• Irish Ancestors
  • Variants - a surname search at the Irish Ancestors site returns info on where a particular variant will be found and a synopsis from the book by Seán de Bhulbh, Sloinnte na hÉireann-Irish Surnames, Comharchumann Íde Naofa, 1997. An acceptable variant is difficult to define. Herein if a variant is acceptable if there is precedent for that name having evolved from the root name and the name is associated with county Cork (or at least numerous and not uniquely connected to some other locale).
• What's In A Name by Nora Hickey 
• Agnomen - often in a locality there would be so many persons of a given surname that a secondary name was added to distinguish one family from another and it evolved to a primary name.
• MacLysaght, The Surnames of Ireland, Irish Academic Press, 1985
• O'Hart, Irish Pedigrees (1892), p. 281
  • The MacNicaill are said to branch off the Coffey 32 generations subsequent to Lughaidh Maccon leading to the modern names of MacNichol, MacNicol, Nicholls, Nicholas, MacNicholas, Nicholson, Nicolson, Nicols, Nicson, and Nixon.