The O'Neill dynasty (Irish: Ó Néill) are a lineage of Irish Gaelic origin that held prominent positions and titles in Ireland and elsewhere. As kings of Cenél nEógain, they were historically one of the most prominent family of the Northern Uí Néill, along with the O'Donnell dynasty. Some O'Neills state that their ancestors were kings of Ailech during the Early Middle Ages, as descendants of Niall of the Nine Hostages.
Two of their progenitors were High Kings of Ireland: Niall Glúndub (from whom they take their name) and Domnall ua Néill. From 1232 until 1616, the O'Neills were sovereign kings of Tír Eógain, holding territories in the north of Ireland in the province of Ulster, particularly around modern County Tyrone, County Londonderry and County Antrim, in what is now Northern Ireland. After their territory was merged with the Kingdom of Ireland and the land was caught up in the Plantation of Ulster, they were involved in a number of events, such as Tyrone's Rebellion, the Flight of the Earls, the Irish Rebellion of 1641 and the Irish Confederate Wars.
Naming conventions
Male Daughter (long) Daughter (short) Wife (long) Wife (short) Ó Néill Iníon Uí Néill Ní Néill Bean Uí Néill Uí Néill
Origins The O'Neill lineage claims descent from Niall Glúndub, a 10th-century king of Ailech as well as High King of Ireland. Niall was descended from the Cenél nEógain branch of the Northern Uí Néill. The first to adopt the patronymic surname was Niall Glúndub's great-grandson, Flaithbertach Ua Néill.
The clan is not mentioned in the Annals of Ireland between the 1080s and 1160s,Annals of Ireland during which period they emerged from a "very murky background". In 1167, King Ruaidrí Ua Conchobhair of Ireland marched north and split the kingdom of Ailech into two areas. The portion north of Slieve Gallion was given to Niall Mac Lochlainn (McLaughlin), with the portion south of Slieve Gallion given to Áed Ua Néill. The two rival dynasties contested for control over Tír Eoghain until the battle of Caimeirge in 1241, where the O'Neills killed the MacLoughlin leadership.
O'Neills of Tyrone After 1241, the O'Neill house dominated and displaced other clans, using the disruption of the Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169 to their benefit and consolidating power. The Bruce Invasion of Ireland devastated the Norman Earldom of Ulster, which held sway over eastern Ulster and most of its north coast all the way to Derry. Its collapse in 1333 allowed a branch of the O'Neill that had been on good terms with the Normans, Clandeboye, to step into the power vacuum and take control over large parts of eastern Ulster.
In 1493, Henry VII of England referred to Henry O'Neill, King of Tyrone, as "the Chief of the Irish Kings" and gave him a gift of livery.
The earldom of Tyrone was eventually granted in 1542.British Library, Harley MS 5885 (N.L.I. Dublin POS no. 1426) and British Library, Harley MS 6096 (N.L.I. Dublin POS no. 1427) and Sidney, H., Sir Henry Sidney's Memoir of his government of Ireland 1583, Ulster Journal of Archaeology, First series, Vol. III, 1855, p. 46. Footnote no. 6.
After nearly a decade of warfare with the English forces in Ireland, Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, surrendered in 1603, just days after the death of his enemy Queen Elizabeth. Hugh stayed in Ulster as the Earl for another five years. But after numerous threats to his life, he secretly departed Ireland for the French coast in 1607 in what is famously called the Flight of the Earls. Hugh continued to use his title after he fled to the Continent in the Flight of the Earls, although in the law of the Kingdom of Ireland it was forfeit by act of the Irish Parliament a year later. So did his son Shane O'Neill, whose will left his title to his only, if illegitimate, son Hugo Eugenio O'Neill; when he died in 1641 at the head of his regiment in Spain. Other Spanish exiled descendants of Hugh Rua continued to use the title and command the Ulster Irish Regiment in the Spanish Army through the seventeenth century. The last mention of a Conde de Tyrone is in 1691, and Walsh concludes that he died not long thereafter.
O'Neills of Clanaboy
"The descendants of Prince Con MacBryan O'Neill, Tanist of Clanaboy, remained loyal, under every vicissitude, to the traditions of their house, and saved little out of the general wreck of confiscation. They seemed to have preferred fulfilling the solemn pledge of their ancestor, Donald O'Neill, King of Ulster, to 'fight out as long as life should last' rather than adapt themselves to altered circumstances, as the descendants of Shane MacBryan had wisely done," according to Burke's Peerage.
O'Neill descendants in France, Spain, and Portugal In the beginning of the 18th century Felix O'Neill: senior male in linear descent of the line of Brian Ballach O'Neill, and Niall Mór O'Neill's second eldest son, was dispossessed of all his estate through the confiscation applied via the Penal Laws, which led him to immigrate to France. He was a cavalry officer who took part in many battles with the Irish Brigade of the French Army. He fought with the French against the British, the Austrians, and the Dutch (during the War of the Spanish Succession), in the celebrated Battle of Malplaquet, where he died on 11 September 1709."Armorial Lusitano", Afonso Eduardo Martins Zúquete, Editorial Enciclopédia, 3rd Edition, Lisbon, 1987, p. 404
In 1896 Jorge O'Neill of Portugal, paternal nephew of the 1st Viscount of Santa Mónica, submitted his genealogy to the Somerset Herald in London. Five years later, Sir Henry Farnham Burke, KCVO, CB, FSA, Somerset Herald stated in 1900 that "the only Pedigree at present on record in either of the Offices of Arms showing a lineal male descent from the House of O'Neill, Monarchs of Ireland, Kings of Ulster, and Princes of Tyrone and Claneboy, is the one registered in the fifty-ninth year of the Reign of Our Sovereign Lady Victoria, in favor of His Excellency Jorge O'Neill of Lisbon". He then recognized him as the Representative of the House of O'Neill and as the Representative of the Earldom created in 1542 for his kinsman Conn Baccagh O'Neill.Mémorial Historique et Généalogique de la Maison O’Neill de Tyrone et de Claneboy, published by Bergerac, Imprimerie Générale du Sud-Ouest (J. Castanet), 3 rue Saint-Esprit, Bergerac, France, 1899 All of this was granted under Letters Patent issued by the English College of Heralds. Later, the Ulster and Norroy King of Arms granted him the undifferenced arms as the head of the House of O'Neill. Upon that Letters Patent, Pope Leo XIII, the King of Spain, and the King of Portugal all recognized Jorge O'Neill as the Prince of Clanaboy, Tyrone, Ulster, as the Count of Tyrone, and the Head of the Royal House of O'Neill and all of its septs.The O'Neills of Ulster, Vol. III, pg. 349-356 It was from this grant that the Chief Herald of Ireland recognized the family as the Princes of Clannaboy in 1945. The grandson of Jorge and present Prince of Clanaboy, Hugo, has not pressed his senior claim to the entire House of O'Neill out of respect for his O'Neill chief cousins and their own histories.
O'Neills of Shane's Castle The castle at Edenduffcarrick, now called Shane's Castle, has long been a key family site for the Clannaboy clan of O'Neills. Shane MacBrien O'Neill changed its name to Shane's Castle in 1722. After the Plantation of Ulster, some O'Neill families converted to the Church of Ireland and began to intermarry with the new nobility coming from England. One such union was between Mary O'Neill, the daughter of Henry O'Neill the lord of Shane's Castle, and Arthur Chichester. It is through this marriage that the present day Barons of Shane's Castle trace their lineage to the royal family of O'Neill.
The present day title of Baron O'Neill of Shane's Castle is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom."No. 23370". The London Gazette. 14 April 1868. p. 2220 It was created in 1868 for the musical composer Reverend William O'Neill. Born William Chichester, he succeeded to the estates of his cousin John Bruce Richard O'Neill, 3rd Viscount O'Neill, in 1855 (on whose death the viscountcy and barony of O'Neill became extinct) and assumed by Royal licence the surname of O'Neill in lieu of Chichester in order to inherit the lands of his cousin, despite not being descended in the male line from an O'Neill,Holohan, Renagh. The Irish Châteaux – In search of Descendants of the Wild Geese, with illustrations by Jeremy Williams, published by The Lilliput Press, Dublin, 2008. (p. 133) daughter of Henry O'Neill of Shane's Castle. Lord O'Neill was the patrilineal great-great-great-grandson of John Chichester, younger brother of Arthur Chichester, 2nd Earl of Donegall.Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage 1995, edited by Charles Kidd and David Williamson, published by Debrett's Peerage Limited, and Macmillan Reference Books, London, 1995, & 0-312-12557-7, (p.P969) The latter two were both nephews of Arthur Chichester, 1st Earl of Donegall, and grandsons of Edward Chichester, 1st Viscount Chichester (see the Marquess of Donegall for more information). Lord O'Neill was succeeded by his eldest son, the second Baron. He sat as a Conservative Member of Parliament for Antrim.
O'Neills of the Fews "The Fews" is an area in County Armagh, Northern Ireland, that was a sub-territory under the O'Neills of Tyrone. This O'Neill branch is related to the O'Neill of Tyrone through King Eoghan Mor, circa 1432–1436. The king's younger son Aodh (Hugh) pushed into the territory known as the Fews and founded a lordship there based largely on the unlawful confiscation of considerable amounts of land belonging to the archbishop of Armagh.The Concordat between Primate John Mey and Henry O'Neill (1455). Katharine Simms. Archivium Hibernicum. Vol. 34 (1977), pp. 71-82 (12 pages) In the rebellion of 1642, Sir Henry O'Neill, a member of the Fews O'Neills, sided with the English crown while his sons and brothers played a prominent part in the rising. Despite his choice of sides his lands were confiscated and divided among a number of Cromwellian settlers. The chief beneficiary was Thomas Ball, whose grants totalled more than . Sir Henry O'Neill was banished to Connacht, to land in County Mayo, Ireland. Exiled with him was his son Captain Sean/Shane O'Neill. Shane's sons took the surname MacShane, or son of Shane. His grandson William anglicized the name to Johnson. He was a major-general in the American Colonial Army and fought the French at Niagara, New York in French-Indian War. For his significant victory he was granted a baronetcy and made Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet of New York in 1753. The present holder of that estate is Sir Colpoys Johnson, 8th Baronet of New York.
When the Williamite War began in Ireland in 1689, Sir Henry O'Neill's son Turlough was dead and so was Turlough's son Con. The heir to the family's Mayo estate was Con's son Henry, who was a minor and had been sent to France for his education. Despite their non-participation in the war, the O'Neill estates were seized by the Crown. Henry (1676-1745) should subsequently have recovered the confiscated lands; his relatives on the continent feared to send him back to Ireland to stake his claim and the property went by default and was sold in 1702–3. Henry had a heroic career in the French army, rising to become a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Regiment of Clare. He was killed at the Battle of Fontenoy in May 1745, aged 69. Henry was the last undisputed claimant to the lordship of the Fews.