Drumcree’s Irish-language heritage is a rich resource for us all…

Peadar Ó Doirnín (1700-1769) was a native of north Louth (Raskeagh townland), just north of Dundalk. Ó Doirnín was an exuberant sort of character. I imagine him to have been as fond of women and drink as his near-contemporary Robert Burns (1759-96). His songs are still sung today by Irish-speakers, most notably Úrchnoc Chéin Mhic Cáinte (Killin Hill, just northwest of Dundalk) {slow air; and amhrán}.

Ó Doirnín was likely in contact with Arthur Brownlow, of the north Armagh Brownlow estate. Brownlow was a lover of Irish. His manuscript collection was famous across both islands.

While Ó Doirnín was from a Catholic background and had some Jacobite sympathies, he was not a simply a propagandist. He valued his independence of mind. In his only English-language poem, The Independent Man, he wrote:

A Whig or a Tory, High Church or Low Church,
Protestant, Roman, Quaker or Clan
Shall ne’er controul me to any other notion
But the same motive I have in my hand;
I’ll travel the road, I’ll meddle with none,
I’ll let them alone by sea and by land,
For providence store me want of their board
I’m covered with clothes and that’s my demand.

Another Louth-Armagh poet, Art Mac Cumhaigh (1738-73) composed an elegy for Ó Doirnín, comparing his writing to the poetry of Ovid, Horace, Virgil and Homer. Ó Doirnín’s death causes an eclipse of the moon; Apollo is ill; Minerva weeps. One poetic genius mourns another.

One of Ó Doirnín’s more interesting poems is Air Mhaluidh Dhroma Chríoch (On Drumcree Hill). Many eighteenth-century Irish poems were dream-poems (aislingí), where the poet retires to a peaceful place, falls asleep, and dreams that a beautiful girl approaches. Typically, she is the personification of Ireland and either prophesises hope for, or recounts sorrow for, our island. In this case, the dreamy Deirdre doppelgänger recounts the various tribes and warriors who came to Ireland, from Parthalón to the Milesians.

            Air Mhaluidh Dhroma Chríoch

Air Mhaluidh Dhroma Chríoch theagam dham a’ naoí
‘S a deilbh mar an cáoimh Dhéirdre;
‘tuirsi is ina suidh, aig osnaigh is a’ caoí
‘s gan neach aici ach í na háonar;
Seo mar direadh sí: “Mo chreach agus mo dhígh
Theasduigh úam mo thrí tréunfhír,
Brian cheann corra an tsaoí, Fachtna da shliocht Íre
Is mac Airt do chothadh ‘n fíor fhéile.

On the hill of Drumcree, there I met a girleen:
her beauty akin to fair Deirdre.
‘Twas there she sat sighing, weeping and crying,
lonely, heartbroken, solitary.
She said this to me: I despair and I grieve
since my three warriors left me alone:
Wise Brian Ború the seer; Fachtna of Ír;
and Mac Art who’d give you all he owned.

……..

ge nach chí nois air faghail aon díobh, mo chrá
nach bhfuil fáon lag fáoi cháin daoirsi.

their era has passed, gone forever, alas:
weakened, in thrall, overthrown.

(I tried to translate ‘sense-for-sense’ (following the internal rhyming within the odd lines, and the end rhyme for the even lines) rather than word-for-word. A more literal translation can be found in Dillon’s reference, below.)

It’s probably not the most appropriate time right now to retire to Drumcree to recite Ó Doirnín’s poem. A Catholic relaxing on the slopes of Drumcree hill; a north Armagh Protestant landowner who loves Irish and treasures the old manuscripts: more spacious times, perhaps. But could this fascinating history be a key that might unlock more mutually-respectful attitudes among those who live in Portadown? As usual, the master – Seamus Heaney – put it brilliantly in his poem The Settle Bed:

                                       Whatever is given
can always be reimagined, however four-square,
plank-thick, hull-stupid and out of its time
it happens to be.

You can find more information on the south Ulster poets at:

• Royal Irish Academy; Dictionary of Irish Biography life of Peadar Ó Doirnín available here
• Ainm.ie life of Peadar Ó Doirnín available as Gaeilge here
• Air Mhaluidh Dhroma Chríoch: Peadar Ó Doirnín c. 1700–1769″, Charles Dillon, Seanchas Ard Mhacha, available here
• “A Hidden Ulster: People, Songs and Traditions of Oriel”, Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin, available to purchase here

Philip McGuinness

Philip McGuinness taught at Dundalk Institute of Technology, plays mandolin with the Oriel Traditional Orchestra and loves to walk around and over the wee perfect hills of the Ring Of Gullion.