Cormac was born in 1552,[1] the eldest son of Dermot MacCarthy and Ellen FitzGerald.[2] His father was the 13th Lord of Muskerry. His father's full name, including his patronymic middle name, was Dermot MacTeige MacCarthy. His own full name was therefore Cormac MacDermot MacCarthy. His father's family were the MacCarthys of Muskerry,[3] a Gaelic Irish dynasty that had branched from the MacCarthy-Mor line in the 14th century[4][5][6] when a younger son received Muskerry as appanage.[7]
His father died in 1570 when Cormac MacDermot was about 18 years old.[30] According to English Common Law he would have immediately succeeded as 14th Lord of Muskerry, but as a minor his estate would have been sequestered by the crown and he would have become a ward. However, Brehon law was applied[31] and his uncle Sir Cormac MacTeige MacCarthy succeeded in his stead, according to tanistry.[32] When this uncle died in 1583,[33] another of his uncles, Callaghan, took his place as the 15th Lord, but resigned in 1584[34] when Cormac MacDermot eventually succeeded as 16th Lord of Muskerry.
House of Lords
Being Lord of Muskerry did of course not include the right to sit in the House of Lords. It was therefore by a special favour that he sat in the House of Lords of the Parliament 1585–1586 as baron Blarney. The year is given as 1578 and is quite certainly wrong: no Irish parliament sat in 1578. The year 1578 is midway between 1571 and 1585. Elizabeth's second Irish parliament sat 1569–1571 and her third 1585–1586.[35][36]
However, Carew suspected that MacCarthy was in contact with the enemy and about to surrender Blarney Castle to them.[39] On 18 August 1602 he arrested MacCarthy and held him at Dublin Castle.[40][41]
Muskerry died on 23 February 1616[43] at Blarney.[44] He was buried in Kilcrea Friary,[45] which probably implied that he became a Catholic late in his life. He was succeeded by his eldest son Charles as the 17th Lord of Muskerry, who would become Baron Blarney and Viscount Muskerry in 1628.[46]
Timeline
As only the year, but not the month and day, of his birth is known, his age could be a year younger than given.
^This family tree is based on a tree of the Lords of Muskerry,[10] a tree focused on his grandson Donough[11] and on genealogies of the Earls of Clancarty,[12][13] the MacCarthy of Muskerry family,[14] the Earls of Thomond,[15][16] and the Earls of Ormond.[17] Also see the list of his children and the mention about his siblings.
^The major genealogical sources do not give a year of birth. One source gives 1564,[50] but this is hard to believe as his father was born in 1552.
^Cronnelly 1865, p. 168. "119. Dermod, lord Muskerry, born A.D. 1501. This Dermod, who died A.D. 1570, was married to Helena, the daughter of Maurice Fitzgerald, and niece of James 15th Earl of Desmond ..."
^Gibson 1861, p. 84, line 9. "There were at this time four distinct chieftainships of the Mac Carthys; the Mac Carthys Mor, or lords of Desmond, and their off-shoots, namely, the Mac Carthys Reagh of Carbery, the Donough Mac Carthys of Duhallow, and the Mac Carthys of Muskerry."
^O'Hart 1892, p. 122, left column. "116. Dermod Mór: son of Cormac Mór, Prince of Desmond; b. 1310; created by the English in A.D. 1353, 'Lord of Muskerry' ..."
^O'Hart 1892, p. 122, top. "Cormac MacCarty Mor, Prince of Desmond (see the MacCarty Mór Stem, No. 115,) had a second son, Dermod Mór, of Muscry (now Muskerry) who was the ancestor of MacCarthy, lords of Muscry and earls of Clan Carthy."
^Lainé 1836, p. 72. "Dermod-Môr, Mac-Carthy, fils puiné de Cormac-Môr, prince de Desmond et d'Honoria Fitz-Maurice, eut en apanage la baronnie de Muskery ..."
^Dunlop & Cunningham 2004, p. 460, left column, line 40. "His mother was Eleanor, daughter of Maurice FitzJohn FitzGerald (brother of James FitzJohn FitzGerald, fourteenth earl of Desmond), and sister of James FitzMaurice FitzGerald, the 'archtraitor'."
^O'Hart 1892, p. 123, right column, line 6. "Issue:—Cormac; Teige, ancestor of the MacCarthys of Insirahell (near Crookstow, co. Cork); Julia ... and Grainé ..."
^McCarthy 1913, p. 66. "Cormac MacDermott, 16th Lord, born in 1552, attended Parliament in 1578 as "Baron of Blarney", and conformed to the Protestant church."
^Meehan 1870, p. 54. "... Dermot MacCarthy who basely abjured the religion of his glorious progenitors had a grant of the place [Kilcrea Abbey] from sir Arthur Chichester, lord deputy ..."
^Hunter-Blair 1913, p. 366, left column. "... imposed upon the university the royal Supremacy and the Thirty-nine Articles, subscription to which was required from every student ..."
^Cokayne 1893, p. 425, line 26. "Sir Charles (alias Cormac Oge) MacCarty, of Blarney and Muskerry, co. Cork, s. [son] and h. [heir] of Sir Cormac MacCarty of the same, by his first wife, Mary, da. [daughter] of Theobald (Butler), 1st Baron Caher [I.] ..."
^Debrett 1828, p. 640. "Theobald le Boteler on whom that office [Chief Butler of Ireland] was conferred by King Henry II., 1177 ..."
^O'Hart 1892, p. 123, right column, line 21. "Julia, who married twice: first, to David Barry of Buttevant; and secondly, Dermod O'Shaughnessy of Gort, in the county of Galway."
^McGurk 2004, p. 122, left column. "With his second wife, Sheelagh, daughter of Cormac MacCarthy of Muskerry, Lord Barry had three more sons and four daughters."
^Canny 2001, p. 155. "... the settlers now contended that these were striving to establish an 'Irish tanist in that country to take away all possibility of wardship and escheat'."
^Gillman 1892a, p. 193. "He [Cormac] was the second son of Teige McCormac Oge MacCarthy, eleventh lord, who died in 1565 ..."
^McCarthy 1913, p. 193. "... he was succeeded by his brother Callaghan as the 15th Lord of Muskerry; but the latter, after a short time, resigned the lordship to his nephew Cormac MacDermot ..."
^McCarthy 1922, p. 193. "Cormac MacDermod, the 16th Lord, born in 1552, attended Parliament in 1578 as 'Baron of Blarney', and conformed to the Protestant Church."
^ abSmith 1893, p. 43. "On the 21st Cormac MacDermot Carty, chief of Muskery, with the Irish under his command, attacked the Spanish trenches ..."
^Webb 1878, p. 303, left column, bottom. "He served under Sir George Carew at the siege of Kinsale and took an active part against the Spaniards and their allies O'Neill and O'Donnell."
^Webb 1878, p. 303, right column, line 2. "Afterwards, Carew learned that he was carrying on a secret correspondence with the enemy, and was about to give up his stronghold of Blarney Castle to the Spanish commander for 800 ducats."
^Clavin 2009, 8th paragraph. "... prompting an unsettled Carew to arrest him [Maccarthy] on 18 August."
^Stafford 1896, p. 227. "The day and time therefore being appointed for his commitment, which was about the eighteenth of August [1602] ..."
^Windele 1839, p. 228. "But in ten years after [1614], the Lord Deputy, Sir Arthur Chichester, committed the care of the convent to Cormac, Lord Muskerry, (a Protestant then,) upon condition, that he should not permit the friars to live in it, and that none but English Protestants should be admitted as tenants to the land."
^ abBurke 1866, p. 344, right column, line 8. "Sir Cormac MacCarthy, of Blarney, called Cooch or Blind, Lord of Muskerry, who m. [married] 1st Mary, dau. [daughter] of Sir Theobald Butler, Knt., Lord of Cahir, and by her left at his decease, 23 February, 1616, two sons ..."
^Windele 1839, p. 223, line 9. "Besides this prince, the following lords of Muskerry, were buried here,—viz. Cormac Og Laidir, son of the founder, in 1536; Teig, son of Cormac Og, in 1565; Dermot, son of Teig, in 1570; and Cormac, who had been some time a Protestant, in 1616."
^Cokayne 1893, p. 425, line 26. "... was cr. [created] 15 Nov. 1628, Baron Blarney and Viscount Muskerry, both of co. Cork [I. [Ireland]], for life, with rem. [remainder] to his son Donough and the heirs males of his body ..."
^McCarthy 1913, p. 70, line 4. "Cormac, the 17th Lord of Muskerry (born 1564, died 1640),"
^Cokayne 1893, p. 425, line 29. "He [Charles MacCarty] m. [married] firstly, about 1590, Margaret, da. [daughter] of Donough (O'Brien), 4th Earl of Thomond ..."
^Ohlmeyer 2004, p. 107, left column, line 31. "Donough's mother died in or before 1599 when his father married as his second wife Ellen (d. in or after 1610), widow of Donnell MacCarthy Reagh and daughter of David Roch, seventh Viscount Fermoy."
^Joyce 1903, p. 172. "On the 23d of September, 1601, a Spanish fleet entered the harbour of Kinsale with 3,400 troops ... "
Fryde, E. B.; Greenway, D. E.; Porter, S.; Roy, I., eds. (1986). Handbook of British Chronology. Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, No. 2 (3rd ed.). London: Offices of the Royal Historical Society. ISBN0-86193-106-8. – (for timeline)
Lainé, P. Louis (1836). "Mac-Carthy". Archives généalogiques et historiques de la noblesse de France [Genealogical and Historical Archives of the Nobility of France] (in French). Vol. Tome cinquième. Paris: Imprimerie de Bethune et Plon. pp. 1–102. OCLC865941166.
