Author Topic: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?  (Read 8818 times)

Offline luimneach

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Re: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?
« Reply #9 on: Tuesday 14 June 11 13:05 BST (UK) »
Thanks for that scunsan.Some people seem to jump to the conclusion that any name beginning with dela is of French or Norman ancestry.Some time ago I came across someone who insisted despite all the facts that their Delaney family from Laois,which is of course O Dubhshlaine was from the French Delaunay

Offline Blue70

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Re: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?
« Reply #10 on: Wednesday 15 June 11 14:11 BST (UK) »
This surname has possibly got roots in the Anglo-Norman French settlers of Ireland. I knew a person here in Liverpool some years ago with this surname it was spelt Delahunty.

C
Delahunty is not  Norman at all despite its appearance in English but Gaelic from Ó Dulchaointigh. It originates in Co Laois formerly called Queens County.

I did say possibly and it's not a bad call considering the Anglo-Norman French influences on Ireland.

C

Offline scunscan

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Re: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?
« Reply #11 on: Thursday 16 June 11 00:01 BST (UK) »
Fitzpatrick is another one that catches people out. They were really Mac Giolla Pádraigs (Gilpatrick) and just adopted the Fitz to look Norman. The Fitzgeralds on the other hand went totally native and became Mac Gearailts.

Offline Blue70

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Re: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?
« Reply #12 on: Thursday 16 June 11 00:35 BST (UK) »
I'm a grandson of a Mac Giolla. Not from my Irish lot but from my Manx lot:-

"MYLCHREEST and MYLECHREEST, contracted from MacGilchreest, a corruption of MacGiolla Chriosod, the son of Christ's servant.

Giolla, especially among the ancients, signified a youth, but now generally a servant, and hence it happened that families who were devoted to certain saints, took care to call their sons after them, prefixing the word Giolla, intimating that they were to be the servants or devotees of those saints.

Shortly after the introduction of Christianity, we meet many names of men formed by prefixing the word Giolla to the names of the celebrated saints of the first age of the Irish Church, as GIOLLA-AILBHE, GIOLLA-PHATRAIG, GIOLLA CHIASAIN . . .

And it will be found that there were very few saints of celebrity, from whose names those of men were not formed by the prefixing of Giolla . . .

This word was not only prefixed to the names of saints, but also to the name of God, Christ, the Trinity, the Virgin Mary, Some of the later forms of this name commencing with Mall, Maul, Molle, and Molly, would suggest a derivation from Maol, Mael, or Moel, which 'was anciently prefixed, like Giolla, to the names of saints, to form proper names of men, as MAOLCOLAIM, Maol-Seacnaill, which mean the servant or devotee of the Saints Columb and Secundinus. The word Mael means bald, shorn, or tonsured.

In the Isle of Mann, however, the earlier form is invariably MacGil, so it is probable that most of our Mylchreests are derived from MacGiolla. This name, and all those commencing with 'Myl' are purely Manx."

C


Offline scunscan

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Re: Dalhunty, Dulhanty, Delahunty etc Irish?
« Reply #13 on: Thursday 16 June 11 22:26 BST (UK) »
Maol comes from the fact that the Celtic tonsure of a priest or devotee was to shave the head forward from above the ears. The Roman tonsure which came later was to tie a ribbon around the head at ear level and shave beneath it( the monks tonsure most people are familiar with).The name Ryan was originally Ó Maoilriain (Mulryan) although it is now called Ó Riain which is incorrect. Mulhall came from Ó Maolfhabhail The devotee of Fabhal.The Celtic priests had families just like the Eastern Orthodox and Coptics with whom they had a lot in common. Either these Maol/Mul families descended from clergy or people who had a strong devotion to these saints or just people named after the saints.