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| The surname comes
from the Irish MacGiolla Mochuda, meaning 'son of the devotee of (St)
Mochuda'. Its adoption was quite unusual. St Mochuda, a pet form of
Carthach, meaning 'loving', was the seventh-century founder of the
important monastic settlement of Lismore, in Co Waterford. He was a
native of Kerry, and when his fellow Kerryman Ailinn O'Sullivan became
bishop of the diocese of Lismore in the mid-thirteenth century, he
initiated the practice of the O'Sullivans paying particular devotion to
this saint. As a result, the practice grew up among one of the leading
families of the O'Sullivans of using Giolla Mochuda as a kind of title.
The first to use Mac Giolla Mochuda was Conor, who is recorded as having
slain Donal O'Sullivan Beare in 1563. His family, descendants of Donal
Mor O'Sullivan, the common ancestor of O'Sullivan Mor and O'Sullivan
Beare (see O'Sullivan), continued to be known as 'MacGillycuddy
O'Sullivan' or 'MacGillycuddy alias O'Sullivan' well into the
seventeenth century, when MacGillycuddy became established as a surname
in its own right. Even at this point, less-well-off members of the
family continued to be known as 'O'Sullivan' for quite some time. The
family controlled a large territory in the Kerry baronies of Magunihy
and Dunkerron; the name of the great mountains in Dunkerron,
MacGillycuddys Reeks, preserves the record of their ownership. Members
of the family retained large estates in the area down to the twentieth
century. Unlike many other families of the old Gaelic aristocracy, their
line of descent remains clear down to the present day; the current
holder of the title 'the MacGillycuddy of the Reeks', recognised as such
by the Genealogical Office, is Richard Denis Wyer MacGillycuddy, now
resident in France. |
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