Inauguration site

The National Monuments Service's description

The precise location of the inauguration place of the Mac Amhalghaidh / Magawley clan has not been identified and several locations have been suggested (Fitzpatrick 2004, 170-1). In 1837 O’Donovan suggested that the hill beside Tullymagawley House may have been the hill on which Magawley was ‘made’. The Ordnance Survey Letters of 1837 records that the ‘hill of Tullymagawley preserves as a ‘monumentum aere perennius’ the name of the ancient Lord of the soil (Walsh 1957, 7). Dalton (1926, 52) recorded that the ‘inauguration chair of the Magawley chiefs stood on the hillock now called Tullymagawley’. This ‘hill of Tullymagawley’ may be the place described by Cox (1970, 62) in 1970 as a ‘grave-like mound’. A natural looking hillock in the field to the N of Tullymagawly House (WM029-031----) may mark the site of the 'Hill of Tully Mac Awley'. It is possible that this roughly circular shaped mound or hillock is entirely natural with no archaeological features visible (SMR File 23/08/1983). Fitzpatrick suggested that this hill was an unlikely location for inauguration ceremonies and that the 'Hill of Tully Mac Awley' identified by O'Donovan was possibly located in the neighbouring townland of Ballymurry (Fitzpatrick 2004, 170). A hilltop enclosure (WM030-065----) 1.1km to the E of Tullymagawly House standing in the townland of Ballymurry is locally believed to be the inauguration place of the Mac Amhalghaidh clan (ibid.). Fitzpatrick (2004, 171) however suggests that the bowl barrow (WM030-104----) on Knockdomny Hill is the more likely location for the inauguration place of the Mac Amhalghaidh clan.

Compiled and revised by : Caimin O'Brien

Date of revised upload : 21 July 2015

References

Walsh, P. 1957 The Placenames of Westmeath. Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies.

Dalton, J. 1929 The ancient boundaries of the diocese of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise (part 2). Journal of the Ardagh and Clonmacnoise Archaeological Society 1(2), 1-74.

FitzPatrick, E. 2004 Royal inauguration in Gaelic Ireland c.1100-1600: a cultural landscape study. Studies in Celtic History 22. Woodbridge. The Boydell Press.

Cox, L. 1970 The Magawlys of Calry. Journal of the Old Athlone Society 2, 61-71.