Fynes Morrison (15661630), Chief Secretary to Lord Mountjoy from 1600 until the latter's death in 1606, was the person responsible for concealing the death of Queen Elizabeth from Hugh O Neill, Earl of Tyrone, thereby fooling O Neill into making his March 1603 submission to a dead queen.
The Irish section of his three-part Itinerary, published in 1617, is most revealing of Morrison, and most interesting in his mainly unflattering views on Ireland and the Irish.
In a portion published last year by the Irish Manuscripts Commission and edited by Graham Kew, Morrison wrote: "The men, as well meree Irish as the olde inhabitants of the English Irish, hold it a shame to goe abroade or walk with their wives, and much more to ride before them on horsebacke. They hold it a disgrace to ryde vpon a mare. They hold it a filthy thinge to breake wind backward, so as hauing any such occasion, they will bare themselues only for that purpose, and because the English doe not so, they call vpon such accidents Cacatrouses (in playne English shite breches) yea they seeme to abhorr it in nature, for we haue knowne great men putt away their wyues only for once making this small fault."
He added that it was "no rare thing to see the wiues of great men to make water as they stoode talking with men, some in the Rushes of the Presence Chamber at Dublin, and to doe openly the most secret necessities of the body".
A presence-chamber is described in the Shorter Oxford Dictionary as where a ceremonial attendance upon a person of superior, especially royal rank took place, and first noted in 1735.
We have not located this building, nor does it appear that the rushes nearby gave rise to a placename, as happened in other places. Luachair, sometimes luachra, means "rushes, rushy place, rushland", was anglicised Logher/Lougher and Loughry. Lougher names townlands in Cos Kerry and Meath, the latter being in the parish of Duleek. A fiant of 1567 shows that Richard Coleman received a lease of the lands in Logher, Co Meath.
Indeed the Colemans had been in north Leinster for quite some time prior to then. The Justiciary Rolls show John Colleman de Dongouel among Kildare jurors in 1311, John Colman and Geoffrey Colman among the jurors there in 1312 and 1314, and two of the name were among Dublin jurors in 1310 and 1314.
The Irish Fiants of the Tudor Sovereigns 1521-1603 lists Colemans, O Colmans, O Collmaines, etc., in Maynooth, Co Kildare, in the city of Dublin and Mergenstown, Co Dublin. But they were also in Co Cork, Co Galway, Co Clare, Waterford, and in "the country of Annellie".
Though families called Coleman are known to have settled in Ireland as early as the 13th century, having come from England, where the name is numerous, Coleman in Ireland almost always denotes a Gaelic origin" (MacLysaght's Irish Families).
The Gaelic surname is based on the personal name Colman (colm, a dove; colman, small dove). O Colmain, a branch of the Ui Fiachrach, was located in the barony of Tireragh, Co Sligo. "Colemans, however, are more numerous in Co Cork. These are a sept called O Clumhain in Irish which, like the foregoing, originated in Co Sligo". O Clumhain was anglicised Clifford.
Anunala Rioghachta Eireann/ Annals of the Four Masters noted the death of Cucatha O Colmain in 1081, and that of Ceallach O Colmain, bishop of Fearna (Ferns, Co Wexford) in 1117. In the 1659 census, Coleman was among the principal Irish names in Cos Waterford (barony of Coshmore and Coshbride), Dublin (Nethercorss, Balrothery) and Meath (Duleek). Others of the name were tituladoes or leading persons in Co Limerick, Cork city and Liberties, and in Dublin city and Liberties.
Current telephone directories show 276 Colmans, strongest in the west and north-west, and 1,095 Colemans, fairly evenly spread throughout Leinster and Munster. One Ni Cholmain and 14 O Colmain entries are noted. Eleven of the latter have the apostrophe (meaningless) after the O, while the remaining three, presumably intended by their bearers to have a fada over the O, are bereft, unaccented. In fact there is no fada to be found in the combined directories! Surely in this day and age Telecom Eireann (Eircom?) could afford a fada on their typewriters!
Colmanstown names townlands in Cos Clare, Galway, Offaly and Dublin. That of Galway is Baile Ui Chlumhain; that of Offaly is Baile an Cholmaraigh. That of Dublin is in the parish of Celbridge, where Roger Colman was resident in Kildroght (Cill Droichid, Celbridge) in 1328. O Riain