1577  - 1580 AD   -    The  Second Desmond Revolt

1577 AD  Elizabeth 1st the Welsh Tudor English Queen founded Trinity College as an anti - Catholic and anti - Gaelic University for her English Ascendancy Episcopalian subjects on the site of the Augustinian monastery of All Hallows in Dublin in Co. Dublin in the north- east of Southern Leinster, which had been originally constructed by 113.Dermott Mac Murrough na Gall - of the Foreigners when he was the Heremonian Cu Corb Ui Cheinnselaig 59th King of Leinster in the 12th Century AD as it had later been confiscated and destroyed by her father, Henry VIII, and she also gave her favourite  Sir Walter Devereux the first English Earl of Essex, the Rathfran Dominican Abbey in the north of Co. Mayo in the mid - west of the Connacht Province.

    The Cathedral at Ferns in Co. Wexford in the south - east of Southern Leinster was also burnt down this year.  

    400 men from Co. Laois and Co. Offaly in the north- west of Southern Leinster were to be killed at the "Blood Hole" at the Rath of Mullamast in Co. Kildare, 2 mile west of Ballitore also in Central Southern Leinster.

    Nicholas Walsh, became the Church of England Bishop of Ossory until 1586 AD, and introduced prayer books and catechisms in the Irish language and was the first to do so.

1578 AD Sheeda Mac Namara the son of Maccon Mac Namara the son of Sheeda Mac Namara the Heberian Dal gCais Ui Caisin East Clan Culien Prince / Tanaiste / heir apparent was slain on Slieve Eachto, while pursuing a party of kerns / foot soldiers from the Anglo - Norman English Burke / de Burgh's Clann Rickarde who were carrying off plunder from throughout the region.

      Sir Nicholas Malby, acting on behalf of Elizabeth 1st the Welsh Tudor English Queen took over the Heremonian Dal Cuinn Ui Briuin Ai Sept's massive Roscommon Castle previously occupied by the Heremonian Dal Cuinn Ui Briuin Ai Ui Conchobhair O Connor Kings who had their kingdom and territory there in Co. Roscommon in the east of the Connacht Province, that had been originally constructed there by an Anglo - Norman Baron who had been the appointed English Justicar in Ireland at an earlier time.

1579 AD The beginning of the Second Desmond Rebellion occurred with Spain and England at War, and there was also to be another rebellion in Ireland by the Gaelic Irish Chiefs themselves who were by now under great pressure also in the Munster Province, against the Dublin Castle (The Devil's 1/2 Acre) English authorities there, and also in further defence of the ethnic and the never - ending sectarian oppression being carried out by Elizabeth 1st  the Welsh Tudor English Queen against their Irish Catholic faith. Sir John Fitz Gerald, the Anglo - Norman English Earl of Desmond's brother, killed a group that included Henry Davell who was Elizabeth 1st's English Commissioner appointed to control the Irish population in the Munster Province, together with Carter the English Provost Marshall, who had previously wanted the Mere Irish to kill any of the Spanish sailors, who were coming to assist the Irish cause when they arrived in Smerwick. 2 of the Catholic clergy, O Healy the Catholic Bishop, and Father O Rourke there, were murdered by the English Military forces at Dingle in Co. Kerry just before Sir James Fitz Maurice Fitzgerald was to arrive back into Ireland with a force of 80 Spanish fighting men at Smerwick / Ard na Caithne (The Height of the Arbutus) also in Co. Kerry in the south - west of Munster. On landing the Spanish immediately began to build the Fort del Oro / The Golden Fort / Dun an Oir on a rocky spur in the harbour at Smerwick Bay, under the direction of both Dr. Nicholas Sanders the Pope's Nuncio, and James Fitz Gerald himself as they had come to render assistance to the cause of Gerald Fitz Gerald the Catholic Anglo - Norman sixteenth Earl of Desmond in Southern Munster, who was involved in the Desmond Rebellion on this occassion, and to this end they declared a Holy War against the ongoing ethnic and sectarian oppression being continued on by Elizabeth 1st in Ireland, James Fitz Gerald had received assistance from both King Phillip 11 of Spain, and Pope Gregory X111 who had also offered him men to assist his just cause along with a Papal Bull / Letter that declared Elizabeth 1st / Persona Non Grata, not only in Ireland, but also in England, because of her continuing ethnic and sectarian oppression there also. Despite these pockets of resistance to all of this ongoing misery, there was still no outstanding individual Gaelic leader now left among the Gaelic Irish Septs in Ireland to actually head a total Irish Uprising, and to top it all off, James Fitz Maurice Fitz Gerald, the Anglo - Norman leader who was the son of Maurice Dubh Fitz Gerald was also to be killed in a battle by the Anglo - Norman Burkes from the Clan William, that occurred near Cnoc Greine in Co. Limerick while on his way to pray for deliverance at the Holy Cross monastery in Co. Tipperary in the north - east of Munster, Meanwhile the Irish defenders who were supporting The O Connor - Kerry at this time at the Carrigafoyle Castle, which was situated on the left bank of the mouth of the River Shannon, were also driven back up to the very top of the castle by the besieging English Military forces, who then began hurling them bodily from off of the parapets, and if any of them were physically able to survive this, they were then hung. Two of the Fitz Geralds who were the sons of the Anglo - Norman Earl of Desmond came up against Sir William Drury the English Chief Justice in Ireland at Gort na Tibraid in Co. Limerick near Ceann Febrat were 3  of his English captains were to be killed in the action and Sir William Drury himself was to die later on.

November: Italian support for the Irish cause also arrived, under San Giuseppe, who had 700 men with him to strengthen the fort at Smerwick / Beal Ban on the headland in Co. Kerry in the south - west of the Munster Province, but they too were forced to surrender to Lord Grey / de Wilton, Elizabeth 1st the Welsh Tudor English Queen's Lord Deputy in Ireland and Sir Walter Raleigh who was the English Captain of the Guard at Dingle, after the English Admiral Winter had already captured their ships. Lord Grey had previously attacked them with 800 men and cannons, and after 3 days of merciless bombardment the defenders there, including the Gaelic Ithian Septs who had their kingdom and territory in Southern Munster, the Spaniards, their English Catholic supporters and Irish women and children were to surrender, on the condition that their lives would be spared. (Just like so many English leaders before him, he reneged on his promise, and put to death all of the 600 people who had surrendered there, who were all massacred, including local Irish women. (50 years later on, Pierce Ferriter the Anglo - Irish Confederate leader, would win back Smerwick for the Irish, in what was to be another Irish Uprising against the everlasting English ethnic and sectarian oppression. The terrible butchery that was carried out by Lord Grey on this occasion also was so repugnant an act that he too was censored for his cold inhumane brutality, especially for the killing also of 3 other innocents, Father Laurence O More, Oliver Plunkett / Pluinceid, and William Wollick who was an English Catholic. Their only crime was that they had refused to acknowledge Elizabeth 1st as their Supreme religious head, and his sickening means of punishment on this occasion was to break their arms and legs with a hammer and then hang them up to die an agonizing death, and after he carried out these terrible massacres he sent Edward Denny off to report to Elizabeth 1st on the results of this operation, and she rewarded him also with a knighthood and also the territory of the Desmond Fitz Geralds themselves. Edmund Spenser who had accompanied Lord Grey / de Wilton to Ireland as his secretary was also given 3,000 acres of the Desmond's land and their Kilcolman Castle in the north of Mallow and to the south of the Ballyhoura Mountains, which included Doneraile and Doneraile Court (now a public  park) on the River Awbeg in Co. Cork in Southern Munster for 15 years. (Despite this great Irish land acquisition Edmund Spencer was to continue to live in Dublin for 8 years in fear of the Irish Families who had been treated so badly there in Southern Munster, which was certainly a well grounded fear for eventually the Irish and the surviving Fitz Geralds themselves were to come down from the Ballyhoura Mountains to burn him out. 

November: Elizabeth 1st the Welsh Tudor English Queen proclaimed Gerald Fitz Gerald, the Anglo - Norman sixteenth Earl of Desmond, a traitor when he personally landed with his men at Youghal in Co. Cork in the south - east of the Munster Province, in what was then part of their Desmond territory, and they destroyed the town there and Thomas Butler the English Royalist tenth Earl of Ormonde who arrived a few weeks later hung the town's Mayor, Coppinger, in front of his own house, for not defending the town against the forces of Gereald Fitz Gerald. (On this occasion the Heremonian Dal Cuinn "northern" O Nialls in the Ulster Province had not only sided with the English, but also fought against the Geraldines of Desmond). In desperation Gerald Fitzgerald who was to be the last Anglo - Norman and sixteenth Earl of Desmond sought refuge at Askeaton Castle in Co. Limerick near the River Deel, from where he then hid out for the next 4 years in the Co. Kerry hills in the south - west of the Munster Province. (One positive from this particular Desmond Rebellion against Elizabeth 1st and her continuing ethnic and sectarian persecution, was that it went a long way, once again, towards welding together the very strong cultural character and Catholic faith of all those persecuted continually in Ireland, and also the fate of Ireland, by the majority of the Mere Irish and the Anglo - Norman - Irish people, as they became even closer now both as Irish men and Irish women in a very common cause in Ireland.

     Elizabeth 1st, the Welsh Tudor English Queen, gave the Mayor of Galway City jurisdiction over Galway Bay and the Aran Islands in Co. Galway in Southern Connacht, because the "14 foreign tribes of Galway" who had been "planted" there as usual had stayed loyal only to the English cause.

     The English White Castle was constructed this year in Athy in Co. Kildare in Central Southern Leinster against the Irish Septs there, in the region where the Athys / Ataoi, who were of Anglo - Norman origins, and also one of the "14 foreign tribes of Galway" had initially originated in Ireland in the early 14th Century AD where Preston's Gate is still there to be seen. Another English castle was also built at Athgoe in Dublin in Co. Dublin this year in the north - east of Southern Leinster in The English Pale for the same purpose.

1580 AD Lord Grey / de Wilton, who was Elizabeth 1st's the Welsh Tudor English Queen's appointed English Lord Deputy in Ireland, besieged the Irish Septs up into Glenmalure / Maoiliura's Valley in the Co. Wicklow mountains in the the south - east of Southern Leinster, which was the kingdom and territory of the "ferocious" Heremonian Ui Laoghaire UI Lughaidh Cu Corb Ui Dunlainge O Byrnes and O Tooles, and he was to be thoroughly defeated there by their renowned Milesian Gaelic leader, Fiach mac Hugh O Byrne.  

      John Fitz Gerald, the son of the ill - fated Gerald Fitz Gerald the Anglo - Norman sixteenth Earl of Desmond, plundered the territory of Thomas Butler the Royalist tenth English Earl of Ormonde in Co. Kilkenny in the south - west of Southern Leinster, and Thomas Butler and Pelham ruthlessly attacked the Desmond territory in Co. Kerry in the south - west of the Munster Province and burnt it to the ground, with 3,000 acres of their territory there initially confiscated by Elizabeth 1st who was to eventually all up confiscate 200,000 acres of their Desmond Estates altogether in Munster. She was then to put in English Ascendancy Episcopalian Church of England "planters," while giving vast tracts of Irish land to her favourites, including Sir Walter Raleigh, (who was originally from Devon in England), who had supported her cause in Ireland, with a future further grant of 42,000 acres of the Desmond lands, where he is credited with eventually planting the first potatoes in Ireland at Youghal in the north - east of Co. Cork in Southern Munster. (It was also then against English Law to use any Irish tenants on any of the Irish land). 574,000 acres of Irish land was to be confiscated all up in the Munster Province, and after the Second Desmond Rebellion he also introduced further English Church of England "planters" from Devon and Somerset in England, but despite this the Mere Irish and the Anglo - Norman - Irish eventually were to retrieve most of the territories back as these particular plantations were also to be not very successful.

      Strancally Castle, situated 7 miles north of Youghal, overlooking the River Backwater in Co. Cork in the south - east of the Munster Province, was among those destroyed during the Second Desmond Rebellion, but the ruins are still there to be seen today and Thomas Butler the English Royalist tenth Earl of Ormonde also blew up the "Murdering Hole" of the Desmonds in the rock near the Stancally Castle, while out searching for Gerald Fitz Gerald the ill - fated Anglo - Norman sixteenth Earl of Desmond.

    Daniel O Hanrahan from the Heberian Dal gCais Ui Turlough Sept who lived in Co. Kerry in Southern Munster was killed by the English Galls at Lislaghtan.

    Glin in Co. Limerick in the mid - north - west of Munster, was to be held by the Fitz Geralds for 700 years until their Glin Castle on the River Shannon was to be taken over also by Sir George Carew, another of Elizabeth 1st's cruel English Military commanders who was also to carry out terrible massacres in Ireland on her behalf, The Mac Carthy Mor, the Heberian Eoghanacht Chaisil Chieftain, from the Blarney Castle in Co. Cork in Southern Munster, introduced a new word into the English language when he kept postponing handing over this particular castle also in Co. Cork to Sir George Carew with continuing excuses, until Elizabeth 1st said she had endured enough of that "Blarney," and she also had Sir George Carew confiscate all of the Irish manuscripts in Ireland that he could find, of all their ancient Irish past and Irish heritage, to try and obliterate all of their Irish memory of their Celtic Gaelic Milesian origins, decreeing that "No Irishman was ever to know his grandfather."

     Lady Elle Mac Carthy of Pallas went to a Catholic mass at midnight at the Church of Killalee in Co. Kerry in the south - west of Munster, before she married Florence Mac Carthy in what was by then the ruined Muckross Catholic Church, and for doing this Elizabeth 1st had her put in the Tower of London and then had her head cut off.   

     Donough O Grady the Heberian Dal gCais Chieftain held Clooney Castle in Clooney - Quin in Co. Clare in the north - west of the Munster Province, while Dangan Castle and Danganbrach Castles in Co. Clare were owned by John Mac Namara the Heberian Dal gCais Ui Caisin Chief of West Clan Culien Fionn, while Knoppogue Castle there also was owned by Turlough O Brien, and the Quin Castle, Creganeowen Castle and Cullane Castle was owned by Cumeadha Mac Namara the son of John Mac Namara, Ballymarkahan Castle was also owned by John Mac Namara. The castle at Toonagh in Clooney - Quin in Co. Clare was owned by another member of the Mac Namara Sept and Castletown Castle in the village of Clooney itself was owned by Bryan O Brien. Corbally Castle there was held by Shane Mac Namara who was a son of Mahon Mac Namara.

    Sean Walsh / Mac Bhaiteir Breathnach was born this year in Co. Kilkenny in the south - west of Southern Leinster, who was to become one of the most important and powerful Anglo - Irish poets of his age.

    Michael O Clery was born in Kilbarron near Ballyshannon in Co. Donegal in the Ulster Province, whose Heremonian Dal Cuinn Ui Fiachrach Sept were hereditary scholars, and he and his cousin, Lewy / Lughaidh O Clery received their Gaelic education in the south from Boetius / Baothghalach Ruadh Mac Egan, and afterwards Michael O Clery was to become a Franciscan friar who was to go around collecting Irish manuscripts where ever he could find them to send onto Father Aed mac an Baird / Hugh Ward who was also from Co. Donegal and a Franciscan friar who was in charge of St. Anthony's in Louvain in France who intended to publish "The Lives of the Saints," but died before he could.

     Father John Colgan who was another Franciscan friar in 1645 AD would go on to produce the 2 volumes in Latin instead.

    From the time of *35.Eber Fionn - of Fair Complexion the direct male line ancestor of the Heberian Septs, 31 Kings of Erinn were produced and 61 Irish local Irish Saints would descend from the Septs, and from 86.Tadhg Mac Cian, a son of 85.Cian the ancestor of the Heberian Cianacht Septs would produce 18 Irish Saints of their own, and also be the ancestor of Cormac Gaileang in Luigne Connacht, the Muinter Gadhra / O Garas, the 2 Ui Eaghra / O Haras in the Connacht Province. the O Haras / Ui hEaghra of the Ruta, the O Carrolls of Ely, the O Meachairs / O Mahers in Ui Cairrin, and the O Connors of Keenaughht /  Cianachta Glinne Geimhin Fergal O Gara. Fergal O Gara / Fearghal Ui Gadhra Lord of Magh Ui Gadhra and Cuil O bh Finn from Co. Sligo. In 932 AD the O Garas in Luigne / Leyney in Co. Sligo in Connacht are also descended from 85.Cian, 1043 AD the Mac Carthys were descended from 85.Eoghan Mor. 1014 AD O Brians were descended from 85.Cormac Cass. 1200 AD 91.Conall Gulban was to be the ancestor of the Heremonian Dal Cuinn "northern" Ui Niaill Cenel Conaill O Donnells, The Heremonian Dal Cuinn Ui Fiachrach O Clerys / Cleirighs were to be the last and the greatest school of Irish historians.

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