Amlaíb Ua Donnubáin

Who is Amlaíb Ua Donnubáin?

Amlaíb Ua Donnubáin is the last member of the O'Donovan family to be styled king of Uí Chairpre Áebda in the Irish annals, and in fact the very last known king of this people.

He is the chief victim mentioned by name of a major joint military expedition led by the Anglo-Norman William de Burgh and the three sons of the King of Thomond, Domnall Mór Ua Briain, namely Muirchertach, Conchobar Ruad, and Donnchad Cairprech, into Desmond. The Annals of Inisfallen report the events as follows:

Mac Carthaigh's Book reports them slightly differently:

In any case, this was effectively the end of the over two century long feud between the O'Donovans and the O'Brien dynasty, resulting from the eponymous Donnubán mac Cathail's capture in 976 of Mathgamain mac Cennétig, elder brother of the famous Brian Bóruma. This had originated in competition between the Uí Chairpre and the rising Dál gCais over both territory in what is now northeastern County Limerick and northwestern County Tipperary, as well as the trade brought to the region by the Norse of Limerick City.

Notably Amlaíb was presumably slain near Cenn Eich, the modern Castletown-Kinneigh, which is in West County Cork near Ballineen and Enniskean, very near to the later home of the family in Carbery, that region most likely deriving its name, in a complicated manner, from the people of his family, although it has been argued that the O'Donovans cannot be proven to have ultimately originated among the Uí Chairpre themselves. In any case, as the first O'Donovan noted there, he is the one most sensibly given the principal credit for establishing the family outside the ancient domains of the Uí Chairpre Áebda. But because of the generally poor and confused state of the O'Donovan pedigrees nothing else is known of his life for certain, nor even his precise relation to the later lords in Carbery. Crom Ua Donnubáin, common ancestor of the later families in Carbery, and the next noted in the region after Amlaíb, would appear to have been a nephew or at least near relation.