Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 39.djvu/277

 as far as possible the entrance of females wearing steel crinolines,' the entrances were made very narrow.

He married in 1832 Eliza Wellbank Dickinson of Drypool, Hull, by whom he had five sons, most of whom became engineers. She died 5 Jan. 1882. Muir died 15 June 1888, and was buried in Brockley cemetery.

 MUIRCHEARTACH (d. 533), king of Ireland, was son of Muireadhach, son of Eoghan, eldest son of Niall Naighiallach, and is usually spoken of in Irish writings as Muircheartach mor macEarca. His mother's name was Eirc, daughter of Loairn (Book of Leinster, 183 b, 30), and after the death of his father she married Fergus, son of Conall Gulban, son of Niall, by whom she was mother of Feidilmid, father of Columba [q. v.], so that Muircheartach was one of the kings to whom the saint was related (Adamnan's Life of St. Columba, ed. Reeves, p. 8). A tract in the ‘Book of Ballymote’ states that in early youth he was banished from Ireland for a murder, and became acquainted in Britain with his kinsman St. Cairnech (Leabhar Breathnach, ed. Todd, pp. 178–93). The succeeding statement that he came from Britain to assume the kingship of Ireland, landing at the mouth of the Boyne, is contrary to the evidence of the chronicles. He is first mentioned in the ‘Annals of Ulster’ in 482 as fighting in the battle of Ocha in Meath, in alliance with the Dal nAraidhe and the Leinstermen against Oilill Molt, king of Ireland, who was slain, and Lughaidh [q. v.], cousin of Muircheartach made king. In 489 he led the Cinel Eoghain, of whom he was chief, against Oengus mac Nadfraich, the first Christian king of Munster, and slew him in the battle of Cellosnadh, now Kellistown, co. Carlow. Illann, son of Dunlaing, one of his allies in this battle, led the Leinstermen against him in 497, and was defeated at Indemor, co. Kildare. The brother of Duach Teangumha, king of Connaught, had put himself under the protection of Muircheartach, but was carried off by the Connaughtmen. The Cinel Eoghain were at once led by their chief into Connaught, and won a victory in 504, killing the king in the Curlieu Hills.

In 517 Lughaidh died, and Muircheartach soon after became king of Ireland. After further war with the Leinstermen, he attacked the Oirghialla, the only important neighbours with whom he had not fought, and conquered from them the northernmost part of their territory, from Glen Con to Ualraigh, both in co. Derry, a region which remained in the possession of the Cinel Eoghain till the plantation of Ulster. The Leinstermen again attacked him in 524, but he defeated them at Athsighe, a ford of the Boyne, and two years later invaded Leinster, winning battles at Eibhlinne, at Magh Ailbhe, at the Hill of Allen, and at Kinneigh, all in the co. Kildare; afterwards ravaging the district known as the Cliachs in Carlow. In the same year he fought the battle of Aidhne against the Connaughtmen. His wife was Duaibhsech, and she bore him five sons, of whom three were dead in 559, when Domhnall and Feargus became for three years joint kings of Ireland. He had a concubine, Taetan, who was of a tribe which he had dispossessed from the neighbourhood of Tara. She revenged the wrong by setting fire to the house of Cleitech, on the Boyne, where he was drunk, on All-halloween in 533. His death is the subject of a very old bardic tale, ‘Oighidh Mhuircheartaigh moir mic Earca.’ His exploits were celebrated in a poem beginning ‘Fillis an ri Mac Earca alleith na Neill,’ by Ceannfaeladh fodhlumhtha, who died in 678. It describes how he carried off hostages from Munster, and gives some idea of the scale of great victories in his time in the expression ‘Foseacht beiris noi ccairpthi’ (‘Seven times did he carry off nine chariots’).

 MUIRCHEARTACH (d. 943), king of Ailech, usually known in Irish writings as ‘na gcochall gcroicionn,’ of the leather cloaks, was son of Niall Glundubh [q. v.], king of Ireland, and grandson of Aedh Finnliath, king of Ailech, or Northern Ulster, and of Ireland. He is first mentioned in the chronicles in 921, the year of his father's death, as winning an important battle over Godfrey, a Dane, near the mouth of the river Bann. On 28 Dec. 926, at the head of his own clan, the Cinel Eoghain, and in alliance with the people of the lesser Ulster or Ulidia (Down and Antrim), he defeated a large force of Danes at Droichet Cluna-na-cruimhther, near Newry, co. Down, but was obliged to retire to Tyrone on the arrival of Godfrey of Dublin with a fresh force of Danes. In 927 he defeated and slew Goach, chief of the 