The Great Ferriter Family

Maurice FitzGerald, c1180 Muiris Feiritear (An Chéad Ainmneacha) Analysis of Irish genealogies via examination of naming patterns is a proven and recognized practice. Persistence of certain favored family names generation to generation also has recognition as a means of evaluating common ancestry and collateral bloodlines. Given name preferences show up in different ways within many Irish and Norman-Irish from the earliest period. This investigation will attempt to use these methods in treating an aspect of Ferriter Family history. One of the mysteries in the Ferriter Family’s history involves the nature of the relationship between Lucas na Srianta (Luke of the Bridles), and Piaras Feiritear (1),... Read More

Anyone reading this who might also read the occasional news update on Facebook's "The Great Ferriter Family" may recognize that work has commenced on compiling a "Red Book of the Ferriters" (Leabhar Deargh an Fheiritearaigh). Such a document would be a comprehensive family history, genealogy, reference and register.   The idea of such a book extends directly from the Irish, who kept such compilations within their septs, to chronicle and document the family history. These were not usually single volumes, but in some cases rolls of parchment, bound books, loose documents, all taken together and considered as one thing. Most such collections only exist in... Read More

The following information attempts to provide a bit of illumination upon the deep past of the Ferriter Family in Kerry. What has been done here is to create a timeline of sorts, with the known and suspected heads or chiefs of the Ferriter Family called out upon it. First a bit of background: Several sources exist that identify individuals in the early record. These sources either extend from the Calendars, (summary abstracts made of records later destroyed in the Four Courts fire of 1922), or are from records outside of what had been in the Public Records Office when the fire occurred. A list of... Read More

Many members of the Ferriter Family today are aware of the legend that maintains Piaras Feiritear as the last of his tribe. The facts do not support Piaras as the last – certainly we know that his father lived to become a grandfather, with Piaras’ son’s furthering the line, and certain evidences exist that suggest Piaras may have had at least one brother or a cousin. Those things said, that the Ferriters were a rare breed during the early 1600s seems doubtless. With the family having been established in West Kerry for over 300 years before Piaras came along, the idea that there were only... Read More

Causation trumps randomness, every time. That events emerge as consequences of precursors, and are formed by myriad related influences that also extend from predecessor commissions and omissions seems without refute. Our lives also then, take certain form under the influence of innumerable actions and reactions extending back into time immemorial. Channeled and directed in more or less greater ways by all that has happened before, we make our choices, and in doing so set in motion the context of the future. Not all those factors at play in our lives have emerged from human activity, and those human influences are in turn the sum of... Read More