Leth Cuinn, and of Ulidia, so that the whole north was represented. The clergy of Armagh and of Meath also attended. Having thus consolidated his power in the north, he marched in 853 into Munster to Mullach Indeona, near Clonmel, and took hostages from the chiefs. Three years later, in a severe winter, he again invaded Munster, defeated its king at Carn Lughdhach, carried off plunder and hostages, and made an alliance with the Deisi, a Meath tribe, who had conquered a kingdom for themselves in the south. In 857 he held a second great tionol or convention at Rath Aedha MacBric (now Rath Hugh, co. Westmeath). Fethghna, archbishop of Armagh, and Suairlech, abbot of Clonard, with Cearbhall [q. v.], king of Ossory, and Maelgualai, son of the king of Munster, and many other chiefs attended. Next year he led an army of his own race, the southern Ui Neill, with Munstermen, Leinstermen, and Connaughtmen, to Maghdumha, now Moy, near Charlemont, co. Tyrone, and there encamped. The object was evidently an attack upon Ailech, and Aedh Finnliath, head of the northern Ui Neill, attacked the camp at night and got into it, but was driven out, though his action saved his country from further invasion. In 859 Maelsechlainn defeated the Danes of Dublin at Druimdamhaighe, King's County. Aedh Finnliath, while Maelsechlainn was on the southern border of Meath, invaded it from the north, evidently anxious to be near Tara in the event of a royal demise. The king, with the aid of Cearbhall, forced Aedh to retreat, but he returned with Danish allies in the last year of the reign. Maelsechlainn died on 30 Nov. 863. An ancient poem on his death mentions that he used to ride a white horse, and that his body, placed on a bier, was drawn to his tomb by two oxen. His daughter, Maelfebhail, died in 887, and his son, Flann Sionna, became king of Ireland in 879, on the death of Maelsechlainn's enemy and successor, Aedh Finnliath. Keating, in his ‘Foras Feasa ar Eirinn,’ has incorporated a poetic composition as to the capture of Turges by Maelsechlainn's daughter, which is perhaps based on the history of Judith, and is not found in any of the extant annals.
[Book of Leinster, a manuscript of the twelfth century, Roy. Irish Acad. facsimile, ff. 217, &c.; Annala Rioghachta Eireann, ed. J. O'Donovan, vol. i.; Annals of Ulster, ed. W. M. Hennessy, vol. i.; Marianus Scotus, ed. B. MacCarthy, Dublin, 1892; R. O'Flaherty's Ogygia, seu Rerum Hibernicarum Chronologia, 1685; James Stuart's History of Armagh, Newry, 1819.]
MAELSECHLAINN II (949–1022), king of Ireland, called by Irish chroniclers Maelsechlainn the Great, was son of Domhnall, son of Donnchadh, king of Ireland (919–944), and great-grandson of Flann Sionna, king of Ireland (879–916), son of Maelsechlainn I [q.v.] , and therefore of the southern Ui Neill. His mother was Donnflaith, daughter of Muircheartach na Gcoiceall Creacan [q. v.]
Maelsechlainn was born in Meath in 949, and probably took part in 969 in the war between his people, Clan Colmain, and Domhnall O'Neill [q. v.] He succeeded to the chiefship of the clan before 979, when he defeated the Danes under Ragnall, son of Amlaff, in a great battle at Tara, co. Meath. In 980, on the death of Domhnall, a descendant of Eoghan Mor, and therefore of the northern Ui Neill, it was the turn of the southern Ui Neill to provide the king of all Ireland, and Maelsechlainn succeeded. He immediately made an alliance with Eochaidh, king of Ulidia, besieged Dublin for three days and nights, seized a great plunder from the Danes, and compelled them to release all their Irish captives. One of the few extant edicts of Irish kings was made by him on this occasion, ‘Cech oen do Gaodhealaibh fil hi ccrich gall i ndaeire ocus dochraide taed as dia thir fodhesin fri sidh ocus fri subha’ (‘Every Irishman that is in slavery and oppression within the foreigner's province, let him go forth to his own land in peace and delight’). In 982 he invaded Clare, defeated the Dal Cais, and cut up and uprooted the Bile or tribal tree of Moyre, co. Clare, under which their chiefs were then inaugurated. The place, though thus laid waste, continued to be used for inauguration for six hundred years (S. H. O'Grady, translation of Cathreim Thoirdhealbhaigh, p. 3), and probably owed its devastation to the fact that Brian Boroimhe [q.v.] was away plundering Ossory at the time. As Brian returned, Maelsechlainn marched across his track, fought a battle with the Danes of Waterford, and invaded Leinster. In 984 he invaded Connaught, destroyed Magh Aei, and burned several cranoges. The example of the Danes was infectious, and in 985 he plundered the church of Ardee, co. Louth, by carrying the shrine of Patrick out of the jurisdiction of Armagh, into that of Clonard, to Assey, co. Meath. For this, however, he had to pay a fine of twenty-one cows and other dues to Armagh, and to submit to its ecclesiastical visitation. The next year there was an epidemic of cattle plague, and he invaded Leinster and brought home a great spoil of cows to repair the loss by the mailgairbh, as this murrain was called. In 989 he won a battle over the Danes outside Dublin, and then besieged the city for three weeks, cut-
