ANNALS OF THE FOUR MASTERSReferences and Further Reading
Anderson, Marjorie O. Kings and Kingship in Early Scotland.
Edinburgh and London: Scottish Academic Press, 1973.
Charles-Edwards, Thomas. Early Christian Ireland. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2000.
Etchingham, Colmán. Viking Raids on Irish Church Settlements
in the Ninth Century. A reconsideration of the Annals.
Maynooth,Ireland: The Cardinal Press, 1996.
Freeman, Martin A. Annála Connacht: The Annals of Connacht
(A.D. 1224–1544). Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced
Studies, 1944.
Grabowski, Kathryn, and David Dumville. Chronicles and
Annals of Medieval Ireland and Wales: The Clonmacnoise-
Group Texts. Studies in Celtic History 4. Rochester, N.Y.
and Woodbridge, England: Boydell and Brewer, 1985.
Gwynn, A. “Some Unpublished Texts from the Black Book of
Christ Church, Dublin.” Analecta Hibernica2 (1931):
310–329.
Hennessy, William M., ed. Chronicum Scotorum: A Chronicle
of Irish Affairs from the Earliest Times to A.D. 1135, with
a supplement containing the events from 1141 to 1150.
London: Rolls Series, 1866.
———., ed. The Annals of Loch Cé. A Chronicle of Irish Affairs
from A.D. 1014 to A.D. 1590. Vol. 1. London: Rolls Series,
1871.
Hughes, Kathleen. Early Christian Ireland: Introduction to the
Sources. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1972.
Mac Airt, Séan, ed. The Annals of Inisfallen (MS Rawlinson
B. 503). Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies,
1951.
———, and Gearóid Mac Niocaill, eds. The Annals of Ulster
(To A.D. 1131). Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Stud-
ies, 1983.
———.The Medieval Irish Annals. Medieval Irish History
Series 3. Dublin: Dublin Historical Association 1975.
McCarthy, Daniel. “The Chronology of the Irish Annals.”
Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 98C (1998):
203–255.
O’Dwyer, B. W. “The Annals of Connacht and Loch Cé and the
Monasteries of Boyle and Holy Trinity.” Proceedings of the
Royal Irish Academy72C (1972): 83–102.
Smyth, A. P. “The Earliest Irish Annals: Their first contemporary
entries, and the earliest centres of recording.” Proceedings
of the Royal Irish Academy72C (1972): 1–48.
Stokes, Whitley. ed. The Annals of Tigernach.3 vols. Vol. I
reprinted from Revue Celtique1895–1896 at Felinfach:
Llanerch Publishers, 1993; Vol. II reprinted from Revue
Celtique1896–1897 at Felinfach: Llanerch Publishers,
1993.
See also Anglo-Saxon Literary Influence; Annals
of the Four Masters; Clyn, Friar; Giraldus
Cambrensis; Invasion Myth; Mac Firbhisigh;
Marianus Scotus; Ua Cléirigh; Religious Orders;
Viking Incursions
ANNALS OF THE FOUR MASTERS
The title given to the chief historical work of a small
team of scribes and historians under the leadership of
the Franciscan friar Mícheál (Tadhg) Ó Cléirigh, these
annals were compiled in two stages between 1632 and
1636 in the “place of refuge” of the Donegal Franciscan
community at Bundrowse on the Donegal/Leitrim bor-
der. Known to its compilers and patron as Annála
Ríoghachta Éireann (The Annals of the Kingdom of
Ireland), its more popular (if inaccurate) title The
Annals of the Four Mastersfirst appears in 1645 in the
introduction to the Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae(Deeds
of the Saints of Ireland) of the Franciscan hagiologist
John Colgan, who adapted the phrase from a thirteenth-
century commentary on the Franciscan rule. The
Annalsform part of the remarkable historical, doctrinal,
catechetical, and hagiographical publishing program
undertaken by the exiled Irish Franciscan community
in Louvain (Belgium) in the first half of the seven-
teenth century. From their arrival in Louvain in 1607,
the friars labored to produce Irish language material
for their missionary work in Ireland and Scotland and
for circulation among exiled Irish Catholics on the
continent. In 1614, they acquired their own printing
press and in 1617 moved to their permanent site at St.
Anthony’s College. Important publications included
Bonaventure (Giolla Brighde) Ó hEoghasa’s An Tea-
gasg Críosdaidhe (Antwerp 1611, Louvain 1614), the
first catechism to be printed in Irish; Flaithrí Ó Mao-
ilchonaire’s translation of a Catalan devotional text
Desiderius(1616); and Aodh Mac Aingil’s Sgáthán
Shacramuinte na hAithridhe(Mirror of the Sacrament
of Penance, 1618).
Like many of the friars involved in this program of
scholarship, Mícheál Ua Cléirigh was a member of a
hereditary learned family who had traditionally been
professors of history to the Ó Domhnaill (Ua Domnaill)
lords of Tír Conaill. Born circa 1590 and baptized
Tadhg, he appears to have followed a military career in
the Spanish Netherlands before joining the friars in 1623
in Louvain, where he was received as a lay brother and
given the religious name Mícheál. His older brother
Bernardine (Maolchonaire) had already joined the
order. Friar Mícheál’s skill as a scribe and historian
was soon recognized, and in 1626 he was sent back to
Ireland by the guardian of St. Anthony’s, Hugh Ward,
to gather whatever he could of the surviving ecclesi-
astical, political, and hagiographical material with a
view to its publication. He spent eleven years traveling
from his base in Donegal to various religious houses
and lay schools throughout the country, transcribing
saints’ lives and martyrologies, compiling genealogies
of the saints and kings of Ireland, and producing a new
redaction of the Lebor Gabála(The Book of Inva-
sions), which was the standard account of the early
history of Ireland. To assist him, Ó Cléirigh assembled
a small team of scribes from among his own kinsmen
and members of other traditional learned families. His
chief assistants were Fearfeasa Ó Maoilchonaire,
Cúchoigcríche Ó Duibhgeannáin, and Cúchoigcríche