SEARC'S WEB GUIDE - Brian Mac Giolla Phádraig (1580/85-1652)

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17th Century Ireland - Brian Mac Giolla Phádraig (1580?-1652)

Brian Mac Giolla Phádraig was born into the ruling family of Upper Ossory. He, like thousands of his co-religious, had to go to Europe to be educated because Catholicism was not tolerated under English law in 17th century Ireland. Mac Giolla Phádraig was ordained in Louvain in 1610 and was appointed Vicar Apostolic to Ossory in 1617. It is known that he transcribed the Book of the O'Byrne's at Castletown, County Cork in 1622 but little else is known of his life until his imprisonment and execution by Cromwellians in 1652.
The poem Truagh t'Fhágbháil, A Inis Chuinn, composed in 1614, is one of the few surviving examples of Mac Giolla Phádraig's poetry and relates his sadness at having to leave Ireland to be educated. The poem contains forty verses in quatrain of which the first four are reproduced here from Measgra Dánta edited by T.F. O'Rathaille (1927) with a modern translation by Eamon Nolan who was an Irish Republican prisoner in Portlaoise Prison from 1980-1992.©

Truagh t'fhágbháil, a inis chuinn
A adhbha ha n-eas n-álainn,
A thrillseach iasgach éanach
Ríasgach innseach oiléanach!
Fúigfe mise ,'s is leasg liom,
Th'amharc-sa, a iath Éireann;
Guais dúinn gurab adhaint uilc

Do mhalairt, a úir ordhairc.

Ní hannsa dh'eínchrích oile,
Ní d'fhuath ort acht dionmhaine,
Tug ar mh'oidh triall ód thuinn-se
A fhial an tshlóigh shéaghainn-se.

Ní fhugfinn tú, a threabh na Niall,
D'fhonn aoibhneasa nó ainmian,
A chtíoch ghargumhal ghabhra,
Acht d'ardughadh mh'ealaidhna.

I am sad to leave you, quite Isle,
Your rivers of the beautiful waterfalls,
You bright Island bountiful in fish,
In birds, in moors and in meadows.

I will leave though I am loathe to,
Your sight, Oh land of Eireann,
And go where there is danger and temptation,
Your very opposite, my fresh land.

I will have it said throughout the land
That it is not hate for you, but vanity,
Has sent me across the waves,
Oh friendly land of the noble tribes.

I would not leave you, tribe of the O'Neills
Seeking pleasure or lust,
Land of my clan of the white horses,
Were it not to further my learning.

© Searc's Web Guide 1997-2008 17th Century Ireland
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