The name Bríd/Brigit and the surname Mac Giolla Bhríde/McBride
Farranmacbride/Fearann Mhic Giolla Bhríde “the land of Mac Giolla Bhríde/McBride”
(see logainm.ie #14820)
Date: 05/02/2024
It is probably a little-known fact that that saints’ names, as found in the placename Kilbride/Cill Bhríde “the church of Bríd/Saint Brigit” discussed last week, were largely avoided as secular personal names in medieval Gaelic Ireland. Bríd as a personal name would therefore have been exceedingly uncommon among those of Gaelic Irish descent during the medieval period. The same is true in the case of Muire, the Irish name of the Virgin Mary of Catholic tradition borrowed directly from Latin Maria. (The common personal name Máire is a much later borrowing from Anglo-Norman Marie.) Although it might sound surprising from a modern viewpoint, the initial popularity of the name Mary in Ireland had nothing to do with Catholicism but rather stems from its use as an English form of the very prevalent but unrelated Gaelic female personal name Mór. The name Mór was so common, in fact, that it is employed in the sense “any typical human being” in the Irish proverb Is leor do Mhór a dícheall (“One can only do one’s best”).
Instead of using these names directly, the Gaelic Irish found another way of commemorating notable ecclesiastics in their personal nomenclature. In almost every case they prefixed the saint’s name with the element maol “devotee, servant (lit. tonsure)” (see eDIL s.v. 3 Mael) or giolla “servant” (eDIL s.v. gilla (e)), as in Maolphádraig, Giolla Phádraig; Maolbhríde, Giolla Bhríde; Maolmhuire, Giolla Mhuire; Maoileachlainn (< Maol Sheachlainn < Maol Sheachnaill); etc. These were all used as male personal names, even those commemorating female saints. In typical Irish fashion, surnames were then regularly formed by the addition of Ó “descendant of” or Mac “son of”, whence Mac Giolla Mhuire/Gilmore, Mac Giolla Bhríde/McBride, etc. (Note that after anglicization, the surname Ó Maoileachlainn became almost universally conflated with the unrelated Mac Lochlainn/McLoughlin.)
On the subject of surnames beginning with Mac, however, it should be noted that Gaelic society was highly patronymic, that is to say, the lineage of an individual or a certain branch of an extended family grouping was typically identified — even in English government documents — using the father’s (and often grandfather’s) name. (See for example ‘Surrender by Cormac Carty fitz Derby alias Cormac m‘Diermod m‘Teig M‘Carty, of the Blarny, co. Cork…’ [Cormac mac Diarmada mhic Thaidhg Mac Cárthaigh (“Cormac — son of Diarmaid son of Tadhg — Mac Cárthaigh/McCarthy”] in a Fiant dated 1589.) Therefore, when we are confronted by a placename such a Farranmacbride/Fearann Mhic Giolla Bhríde (#14820) it can be difficult to determine whether it signifies “the land of the son of Giolla Bhríde (a patronymic used to specify lineage)” or “the land of Mac Giolla Bhríde/McBride (the name of a family)”. This is a common problem in Irish placename studies which normally can only be solved by further complementary research. In the case of Farranmacbride, it is very important to note that a family called Mac Giolla Bhríde/McBride had a clerical pedigree in the diocese of Raphoe and the wider northwest; we know from recent research that such status greatly increases the likelihood of a family’s surname occurring among local townland names. Thus we can understand Mac Giolla Bhríde as found in Farranmcbride/Fearann Mhic Giolla Bhríde to be the surname of a family with clerical associations in the general area, particularly given the fact that the generic element fearann “land” itself most likely refers to former church lands here.
(Conchubhar Ó Crualaoich & Aindí Mac Giolla Chomhghaill)