Provenance
Discovery: Discovered in 1902 by Lord Walter Fitzgerald ‘lying under a bush, in front of Brian McBride’s headstone, in the north-eastern portion of the churchyard’ of Donaghmore. It had ‘formerly served as a head-stone to a grave owned by a family named O’Farrell’ (Fitzgerald 1903-1905, 155). Donaghmore Cemetery represents the remains of an early ecclesiastical enclosure (KD006-005001-). Domnach Mor Maige Lúadat/Núadat ‘the great church of Lúadu’s/Núadu’s plain (Maynooth)’ is mentioned in Old Irish sources such as the Book of Armagh. It is associated with bishop St Erc, a disciple of the 6th-century St Senán. The very archaic term Domhnach (OIr. domnach ‘church’ from Lat. dominicus) in the townland name suggests that it was a very early, potentially Patrician foundation. The surviving church ruins date to the 14th century and the graveyard is also known as Grangewilliam, taken from the name of the farm it was later situated on. Walter Fitzgerald, was a leading antiquarian of Kildare in the early 20th century, and founder of the Kildare Archaeological Society. He added the stone to his archaeological collection in his nearby residence at Carton House. After his death it went to the National Museum in Dublin.
Findspot: Donaghmore (Domhnach Mór), Co. Kildare, Ireland (ITM Coordinates: 696269, 737287 (approximate findspot))
Current repository: Ireland National Museum of Ireland (inv. no. 1931:291)
Last recorded location(s): Now in the collection of the National Museum of Ireland, where it was examined and recorded, in collaboration with the Discovery Programme, for the Ogham in 3D project in 2016.
Support
National Monuments Service SMR ID: KD006-005002-
Object type: Pillar
Material: Sandstone
Dimensions: H 0.74 × W 0.36 × D 0.23 m
Condition: This irregular-shaped pillar of fine-grained sandstone is quite damaged, especially along the edges, having suffered flaking or spalling resulting in the loss of some text. There are numerous short marks and long vertical lines on one of the broader faces (to the left of the first inscribed angle), although it is unclear what significance, if any, these might have.
Inscription
Text field: The inscription runs upwards on both edges of one of the narrower faces, starting on the left angle, commencing 22cm from the bottom, and continuing, at 27cm from the bottom, on the right angle. This layout is not unique in the ogham corpus but is far less common than continuous (up-(across-)down) text. There is a gap of 15cm at the top of the left angle that doesn’t appear to have been inscribed. However, there is some damage here (and across the top of the stone) and so an original final vowel at the end of the first name may have been lost. Word division is not usually a feature of classical ogham, although a few possible cases of extra space following the initial name have been observed (e.g. I-KID-001 Colbinstown 1, Co. Kildare and I-COR-069 Monataggart 1, Co. Cork). In this case, space has been left uninscribed on the upper left angle after the first name and the remaining kin group identification begins on the right angle.
Letters: The strokes of this inscription are very finely scored. The majority of ogham inscriptions, in both Ireland and Britain, show signs of pocking or chiselling (percussion). Some, including a high percentage of those from Co. Cork (hence the term ‘cork-style’), display this very different (non percussion) carving technique, possibly using a knife or other long-bladed implement and producing a finer stroke (deeper at the centre and trailing at the end). Further examples of finely scored strokes from the eastern side of the country include Ballybrack, Co. Louth (I-LOU-002) and two of the inscriptions (I-KID-004 and I-KID-005) from Colbinstown, further south in Co. Kildare. Individual strokes of this inscription are quite uneven in length and in spacing. This may be partly due to the rough surface of the stone. Consonant strokes are between 35 and 65mm in length and tend to taper off at the distal tips. The strokes of some consonants, for example the Q, splay outwards slightly rather than been strictly parallel. Vowels, where they survive, are minute (max. 5mm). There is no clear sloping in the strokes from the aicme muine (Ms and Rs).
Date: Approximately mid-sixth century (linguistic)
Edition
Ogham text: ᚅᚓᚈᚈᚐᚃᚏᚑ[ᚔ]ᚉᚉ ᚋᚐᚊᚔ ᚋᚒᚉᚉᚑᚔ ᚈᚏ̣ᚓ[ᚅ]ᚐ[ᚂᚒ]ᚌ̣ᚌ̣[ᚑ]
Transcription: NETTAVRO[I]CC MAQI MUCCOI TṚE[N]A[LU]G̣G̣[O]
Critical apparatus:
- In the first name (NETTA-VRO[I]CC) only 2 vowel strokes are clear after the R on this irregular and damaged part of the angle. Macalister (1945, 30-31) reads an E here but there would be enough room for an I following the O (Rhys (1903, 76) read o i/e). 2. Although there are some ogham-like marks along the right edge before the M of MAQI, Macalister’s (1945, 31) suggested KOI is not convincing. Many of the vowel notches of MAQI MUCCOI are damaged or worn away in places, though not in serious doubt due to the allocated space. The T looks to be followed by a C, or possibly a Q, and 3 vowel notches. Based more on the available space than clear letters, Macalister (1945, 31) and Rhys (1903, 76) take this to be the remains of TREN. There is partial evidence for the TRE remaining, but the B-surface is badly flaked here and although Macalister (1945, 31) describes this damage as occurring after the N, Rhys (1903, 78) noted only that there was space for an N, lost through flaking. All the can be seen of the reconstruction NALUGGO is the A notch and four H-surface strokes, which could be the remains of GG.
Translation
of Nad-Fráech (*Neta-Vraicas) son of the descendant/offspring of Trénlug (*Trenalugus)
Commentary
Both personal names are well-known from other ogham inscriptions and from the later Old Irish onomastic record. The first element in the name NETTA-VROICC is Nad (the oblique stem of the OIr. consonant-stem noun nía, gen. níad ‘fighter, warrior’). Its second element corresponds to the name that is otherwise found as Fróech or Fráech.
Stifter (2025) comments: ‘The name of the ancestor, if TRENALUGGO is correct, corresponds to OIr. Trénlug ‘strong Lug’, a theophoric compound consisting of the adjective trén ‘strong’ + the divine name Lug. Rhys (1903, 79) compared the name with the gentilic expression ua Trianlugo ‘descendant of Trianlug’ in the Martyrology of Gormán (3 June; Stokes 1895: 108). However, the relationship between the two words is doubtful. The name element trian- rather seems to represent the unrelated word triän ‘a third’, which should appear in ogam as *TRIANA-. But maybe Trianlugo in the Martyrology of Gormán is only a hypercorrection anyway. The parallel entry for 3 June in the Martyrology of Tallaght has the more archaic-looking Aui Trenloco (Best and Lawlor 1931: 47), the spelling of which aligns better with the analysis of TRENALUGGO/Trénlug proposed here. The population group of the *moccu Thrénlogo are otherwise unknown, unless the ‘descendant of Trénlug’ in the martyrologies just mentioned is another member of it. This name is attested perhaps three more times in the ogham corpus, twice in Ireland and probably once on a stone in Wales. In I-COR-071 (= CIIC 120; Monataggart, Co. Cork), the name forms part of the binomial name NETTA-TTRENALUGOS. The second instance from Ireland is fragmentary and therefore uncertain: TRENIL[U?…] (I-KER-120 = CIIC 248; Bawnaglanna, Co. Kerry). The alleged example from Wales (W-CGN-002 = CIIC 348; Llanarth, Cardiganshire) is even more uncertain’.
Stifter (2025) also comments: ‘The only chronologically significant sound change that can be recognised in the surviving letters is the loss of the ending -I in the first name, which would have been *NETTA-VRO[I]CCI at an earlier stage. The vocalism of LU vs. LO in TRE[N]A[LU]GG[O] and the ending -OS vs. -O would be other indicators of date, but since these bits are missing, our supplied letters (based on available space) cannot be adduced as arguments. The frequent geminate spellings of consonants are perhaps another sign of a not-too-old age, but this practice is still too little understood as to be used as a dating criterion. In summary, on linguistic grounds the most likely date of the inscription is around the middle of the 6th century a.d’.
References
- Fitzgerald 1903-5, 155-160
- Rhys 1903, 75-79
- Macalister 1945, 30-31
- Stifter 2025,