UA DUINNIN, Athair Pádraig. Dánta Shéafraidh uí Donnchadha an Ghleanna. Maille le Beathaidh an Fhilidh is Foclóir’

Baile Átha Cliath: Chonnradh na Gaedhilge, 1902. Crown octavo. pp. pp. xxi, [3], 54, [1 (Corrigenda)]. Full maroon morocco, titled in gilt, badge of Chonnradh na Gaedhilge in gilt on upper cover. Ex libris Dalgan Park with stamps. All edges gilt. A fine copy.
Séafraidh Ó Donnchadha an Ghleanna (c.1620-1678), anglicised as Geoffrey O’Donoghue of the Glens, was a seventeenth-century Irish clan chieftain and Irish-language poet, and one of the celebrated Four Kerry Poets. Son of Tadhg Ó Donnchadha an Ghleanna, chief of the Glenflesk lands, he was based at Killaha Castle, a fifteenth-century tower-house commanding the Flesk valley near Killarney. During the Confederate Wars he, his father and brothers took part in the prolonged siege of Tralee Castle in 1642, and he succeeded to the chieftaincy shortly thereafter. Killaha became renowned as a refuge for poets, clergy and scholars, and contemporary verse depicts his household as a centre of hospitality, learning, music and patronage, where Irish, Latin and bardic culture flourished despite political upheaval.
In 1652 Killaha Castle was partially destroyed by Cromwellian forces under General Ludlow, and the Glenflesk region thereafter became associated with outlawed Catholics, hedge-school teaching and resistance culture. Ó Donnchadha nevertheless managed to retain much of his land through the Commonwealth period. Twice married, and father to three sons, he made his will in 1677 and died the following year, probably being buried at Muckross Abbey. His poetry, preserved and edited in Dánta Shéafraidh Uí Dhonnchadha an Ghleanna (1902), secures his reputation as a key figure of early modern Munster verse, a legacy later translated and reassessed in modern scholarship. He is commemorated in Killarney alongside Piaras Feiritéar, Aodhagán Ó Rathaille and Eoghan Rua Ó Súilleabháin, affirming his enduring place in the literary and cultural history of Gaelic Kerry.

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