Aengus M'Uathamore

Alfred Webb

A Compendium of Irish Biography

1878

Aengus M'Uathamore, a distinguished Firbolg chief of the 1st century, who after the battle of Moytura, where the Firbolgs were defeated by the Tuatha-de-Dananns, took refuge in the Aran Islands with his brother Conor. Meave, Queen of Connaught, granted them the islands. He is generally reputed to have been the builder of Dun Aengus, the great fort on Aranmore, upon the summit of the southern cliffs, 300 feet above the sea. Its sea front measures about 1,150 feet. The walls are some 13 feet thick and 18 feet high. The land approaches are defended by rude chevaux-de-frise of splintered rocks. Sir William Wilde characterized this fort as "the greatest barbaric monument of its kind in Europe." A fort on Inismaan is called Dun Conor, after Aengus' brother Conor; while the name of his brother Mil is associated with the strand of Port Murvey, known in Irish as Muirveagh Mil, or " The sea-plain of Mil."

Sources

9. Aran Isles—Papers by Sir William Wilde, (1857); and by G. H. Kinahan, in Science Gossip, 1876. (Pamphlets.)

180. Ireland, Murray's Hand-Book. London, 1866.

Featured Books

An American widow’s account of her travels in Ireland in 1844–45 on the eve of the Great Famine:

Ireland’s Welcome to the Stranger

Sailing from New York, she set out to determine the condition of the Irish poor and discover why so many were emigrating to her home country.

Mrs Nicholson’s recollections of her tour among the peasantry are still revealing and gripping today.

The author returned to Ireland in 1847–49 to help with famine relief and recorded those experiences in the rather harrowing: Annals of the Famine in Ireland.

See more of our books »

The Ocean Plague: or, A Voyage to Quebec in an Irish Emigrant Vessel is based upon the diary of Robert Whyte who, in 1847, crossed the Atlantic from Dublin to Quebec in an Irish emigrant ship. His account of the journey provides invaluable eyewitness testimony to the trauma and tragedy that many emigrants had to face en route to their new lives in Canada and America. The book is also available in Kindle.

The Irish in America by John F. Maguire provides a substantial and invaluable account of the extreme difficulties faced by pioneer Irish immigrants in North America during the 19th Century. The book is also available in Kindle.

The Scotch-Irish in America tells the story of how the hardy breed of men and women, who in America came to be known as the ‘Scotch-Irish’, was forged in the north of Ireland during the seventeenth century. It relates the circumstances under which the great exodus to the New World began, the trials and tribulations faced by these tough American pioneers and the enduring influence they came to exert on the politics, education and religion of the country.

Show fewer titles