Clandeboye or Clannaboy (Irish Clann Aodha Buí, "family of Hugh the Blond") was a kingdom of Gaelic Ireland, comprising what is now south County Antrim, north County Down, and the barony of Loughinsholin. The entity was relatively late in appearance and is associated partly with the Gaelic resurgence of the High Middle Ages. The O'Neill Clandeboy (Ó Néill Clann Aodha Buidhe) who reigned in the territory descended from Hugh Boy O'Neill, a king of Tyrone. His descendants took advantage of the demise of the Earldom of Ulster during the latter 14th century and seized vast portions of territory. Clandeboye's main seats of power were Shane's Castle and Castle Reagh.
The kingdom came to an end at the dawn of the 17th century after Conn O'Neill, the last head of the Clandeboye O'Neills of Upper Clandeboye, was strong-armed into signing away two-thirds of his land to Scottish and English colonial administrators such as Hugh Montgomery and James Hamilton who proceeded to privately settle their land with settlers from Great Britain just prior to the larger Plantation of Ulster. Conn died in poverty 1618. James Hamilton became the first Viscount Claneboye in 1622.
Etymology The spelling of the name has varied over the years, and had been written variously as Clandeboye, Claneboye, Clandyboy, Clannaboy, and Clanaboy. Clandeboye has also been adopted as the name of an electoral ward of North Down Borough Council. It has survived as a geographical location in modern times as an area of Bangor, County Down, Northern Ireland.
History 14th century: emergence and position
The emergence of the Kingdom of Clandeboye is closely associated with the history of its neighbour the Kingdom of Tyrone and the Gaelic resurgence of the 14th century. The O'Neill dynasty that ruled Tyrone had established themselves as a serious power in Ireland by the 13th century, providing Brian Chatha an Dúna O'Neill who was a late claimant to the High Kingship of Ireland before falling at the Battle of Down in 1260.
The O'Neills were, locally, engaged in rivalries with the Norman Earldom of Ulster among other regional foes. In the 12th century, following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the Normans had taken from the native Gaelic Kingdom of Ulster some lands and established their Earldom in the north-eastern corner of Ireland.The indigenous Kings of Ulster before the coming of the Normans were from the MacDonlevy clan, their descendants included the McNulty ("son of the Ulsterman") and allegedly Clan MacLea (Livingstone) in Argyll. The Ulaid kindred claimed descent from Ír, a son of Míl Espáine and brother of Érimón (from whom the O'Neills descend). Even after the Norman invasion, some of the native Ulaidh retained power in parts of old Ulster, in the form of the Magennis clan in Iveagh. Subsequently, they were engaged in conflicts and mutual raidings with their direct neighbors the Northern Uí Néill.
By the 14th century, the Earldom of Ulster was under the Ulster branch of the de Burgh dynasty (other branches of this kinship group held territories elsewhere in Ireland, but became heavily Gaelicised). The Bruce campaign in Ireland, with the defenders of the Anglo-aligned Lordship of Ireland being led by Richard Óg de Burgh, 2nd Earl of Ulster, suffered significantly during the conflict. Eventually the Norman title to the Earldom of Ulster passed to the Mortimer family. Niall Mór O'Neill, King of Tyrone (1364–1397) created a vacuum in the area by driving out some of the Anglo-Norman settlers. The Kingship of Tyrone had in recent times been contested by two sets of cousins, one of which was the Clandeboye O'Neills (descended from Hugh Boy O'Neill), who had provided three Kings of Tyrone in the 13th century, before losing out to the line descended from Aodh Reamhair O'Neill (son of Domhnall O'Neill), whom all subsequent Tyrone kings would descend from.
By 1347, Muirchertach Ceannfada O'Neill was the first King of Clandeboye not to be also King of Tyrone, controlling the parts of the old Earldom of Ulster taken over by the O'Neills. Most of their territory was east of the River Bann, in what would today be called south County Antrim and north County Down. The part of Clandeboye territory which was west of the River Bann was Loughinsholin, in what is today County Londonderry, including part of the Sperrin Mountains. This O'Neill line, which had lost out on the Kingship of Tyrone, although technically at first uirrithe (under-kings) of their Tyrone cousins, soon established their own autonomy. Geopolitically, they looked to offset the power of their Tyrone neighbors, by forming alliances with other powers in the area; the MacDonnells of Antrim (a clan of fairly recent Highland Scots descent descended from John of Islay, Lord of the Isles), the powerful O'Donnells of Tyrconnell and, when it suited, the Kingdom of England's Lordship of Ireland based in Dublin. Clandeboye's lands were suited to cattle grazing and so their rulers were able to attain a significant level of wealth through this.
15th century: shifting alliances Towards the end of the 14th century and into the early 15th century, the Clandeboye shifted away from their rapprochement with their O'Neill of Tyrone cousins and as with the case of their neighbours to the south, the Magennis clan of Iveagh, entered into an alliance with the powerful O'Donnells of Tyrconnell under Turlough an Fhíona O'Donnell (1380—1422).Egan, Simon. (2018). Richard II and the Wider Gaelic World: A Reassessment. Cambridge University Press An ascendant maritime kingdom based in the north-west of Ireland, able to put into the field a strong army with a Gallowglass basis, Tyrconnell mounted a serious challenge to Tyrone's domination of the north of Ireland: Clandeboye and Iveagh saw this as an opportunity to assert more independence for themselves. As part of this complex patchwork of alliances, which spread throughout all of Ireland, there was a wider implication for geopolitics in the British Isles and indeed European politics, in the context of the Hundred Years' War; one faction made alliances with the Plantagenet Kingdom of England, the other with the Stewart Kingdom of Scotland (and thus, by implication of their Auld Alliance; the Kingdom of France). Thus, when Richard II of England visited Ireland and gained the "submission" of a number of Gaelic Irish and Gaelicised chiefs in 1395,Curtis, Edmund (1927). Richard II in Ireland, 1394–5. Encyclopedia of Irish History and Culture there were a few notable absences: the O'Donnells of Tyrconnell (friends of Stewart Scotland) and their Irish allies such as the O'Neills of Clandeboye, Burke of Mayo and O'Connor Ruadh of Roscommon, who never submitted.
Despite being a relatively junior kingdom, Clandeboye was able to hand military defeats to ostensibly stronger powers which tried to invade them during the reigns of the brothers Murtagh Roe O'Neill and Hugh Boy II O'Neill, closely guarding their autonomy. For example, Eoghan O'Neill, King of Tyrone, invaded Clandeboye in 1444 but was defeated. His son Éinri (Henry) O'Neill, the King of Tyrone, tried the same again while invading Clandeboye in 1476, but he too was defeated. Meanwhile, during the reign of Conn O'Neill, when the Anglo-controlled Lordship tried to revive its colony in Ulster, appointing Patrick Savage of Lecale as the Seneschal of Ulster, he was captured in 1481 by the Clandeboye forces and was subsequently "blinded and castrated in captivity", making him unfit to carry on his duties.Robertson, Margaret (1967). The Gloucester Treatment. The New Beacon
16th century: weakening and decline
The Kingdom of Clandeboye had been divided in the early 16th century into "Lower Clandeboye" and "Upper Clandeboye", following a decline in power of the last undivided King of Clandeboye, Murtagh Dulenagh O'Neill. His nephews from two of his older brothers, who had also been Kings of Clandeboye (Phelim Bacagh O'Neill and Niall Oge O'Neill), took advantage of their uncle's weakness and established themselves. This situation was recognised as such and reported by Thomas Cusack, the Lord Chancellor of Ireland in his letter to the Duke of Northumberland on the current state of Ireland in March 1552. Neighbouring the Clandeboye to the north-east were a group of Highland Scots in the Glens of Antrim. They were Gallowglass soldiers under the leadership of the MacDonnell of Antrim who had established themselves by the mid-16th century as Lords of the Glens (the remaining parts of the area which Normans had previously held as the Earldom of Ulster). During a conflict with them, the heir to Clandeboye, Niall O'Neill (son of Hugh O'Neill) was killed in 1537, weakening the natural succession. To the west of Clandeboye were their more powerful O'Neill kinsmen, the O'Neills of Tyrone (from whom the Clandeboye's had branched off in the 13th century).
During the Tudor conquest of Ireland under Henry VIII, whereby the English were attempting to establish the Kingdom of Ireland, various Gaelic kings were offered a policy of surrender and regrant. They could keep their traditional territories as lords, so long as they legally and culturally Anglicised, joined the Anglican Church and pledged allegiance to Henry VIII: Conn Bacach O'Neill took him up on the offer, exchanging the Kingship of Tyrone for the Earldom of Tyrone in 1542. The heir to this title was the Baron Dungannon: Conn Bacach's son Shane O'Neill was overlooked and the title went instead to Shane's illegitimate alleged half-brother Matthew O'Neill. During the 1550s and 1560s, Shane (later known as "the Proud") arose to assert his rights, protesting to Elizabeth I and inflicted notable military defeats on establishment figures such as the Earl of Essex.
The O'Neills of Clandeboye diligently offered their services up to the Crown forces during the campaign of Shane O'Neill. Part of the backstory of this was that Brian Faghartach O'Neill (the oldest son of the aforementioned Niall Oge O'Neill) was assassinated by a then 20-year-old Shane O'Neill in 1548. Retrieved on 23 March 2022. Retrieved on 23 March 2022. Brian Faghartach was the first Lord of Upper Clandeboye, thought likely to be involved in a surrender and regrant, allowing him to establish himself as a Lord of a portion in the now split up Clandeboye. When Shane rose up, he was able to establish his influence over Clandeboye and force it into being one of his urriaght (subsidiary) territories. At Carrickfergus, an Anglo-Irish crown garrison had been established under William Piers with the support of Brian McPhelim O'Neill, the Lord of Lower Clandeboye, who was subsequently knighted for supporting them against Shane the Proud and also the Scots in the Glens of Antrim. Brian McPhelim and some of his relatives acted as intelligence agents to Piers, playing a role in undermining Shane at the Battle of Farsetmore in 1567.