KAVANAGH, Art. The Kavanaghs Kings of Leinster. Illustrated.

Bunclody: Irish Family Names, 2003. pp. x, 308. Blue paper boards, titled in gilt. Signed by the author on titlepage. A fine copy in fine pictorial dust jacket. Scarce.

It is generally accepted that most of the Kavanaghs of modern times descended from Donal the illegitimate son of Diarmuid McMurrough. Donal was described as Caomhanach (an adjective) meaning the man who was fostered at Kilcavan (a monastery in North Wexford/ South Wicklow). From the 14th century, the Kavanagh Kings were acknowledged as the Kings of Leinster and proved to be a very potent force right up to the middle of the 16th century. During that two hundred year period the Kavanaghs established themselves firmly in County Wexford. They took over almost the entire county of Carlow. The O’Nolan and O’Ryan clans of Forth and Idrone accepted them as their overlords. The Kavanaghs were established in the Rower and in Duiske in Kilkenny.

In the course of the fifty years from 1550 to 1600 the Kavanaghs were forced to give up the claim to be Kings of Leinster and the title of McMurrough (or Chief of the Kavanaghs) was also forcibly relinquished. However as late as the first decade of the 1600s Donal Spainneach Kavanagh, the last great leader of the clan was being encouraged to revive the claim to be King of Leinster, by O’Neill of Tyrone. During this period many of the smaller clan landholders of Carlow and Wexford sold their patrimony so that by 1641 any lands remaining were in the hands of only a few descendants of the Kings.

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