Mourne Mountains

Patrick Weston Joyce

1923

Mourne mountains in Down. The ancient name was Beanna Boirche [Banna-Borka], Four Masters, the peaks of the shepherd Boirche, who herded on these mountains the cattle of Ross, king of Ulster in the third century. About the middle of the twelfth century, a tribe of the Mac Mahons from Cremorne (see Cremorne), settled in the south of the present county of Down, and gave their tribe name of Mughdhorna [Mourna], to the barony of Mourne, and to the Mourne mountains.

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