Ó Fíodhabhra

Rev Patrick Woulfe
1923

Ó FÍODHABHRA—IO Fiorie, O Fuery, O Fury, Fury, Furey, (?) Fleury; 'descendant of Fíodhabhra' (bushy-eyebrows, from fíodh, a wood, and fabhra, an eyebrow); also Ó Fíodhabhair, which see; the name of an old Westmeath family who, not improbably, are a branch of the O'Melaghlens. Two of them were bishops, or abbots, of Clonmacnoise in the latter part of the 12th century; and in the next century, Donat O Fiodhabhra, after filling the see of Clogher for nine years, was translated to the primatial see of Armagh. He died in England in 1237, as he was returning from Rome, "with great honour and spiritual glory from the Pope." Before the end of the 16th century the name had spread into Roscommon, Sligo and Cork. It is now most frequently met with in Co. Galway. In Munster the present form is Ó Fíodhabhair, anglicised Feore.

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