script of Giolla Iosa mor MacFirbis, and in 1849 ‘The Genealogy of Corca Laidhe, or O'Driscoll's Country,’ Gillabrighde MacConmidhe's poem on the battle of Down, and other poems, all containing Irish texts with translations and notes. Such productions would have been enough to occupy the whole time of most scholars; but, besides much work for others, transcribing and translating, O'Donovan published in 1845 ‘A Grammar of the Irish Language, for the use of the Senior Classes in the College of St. Columba,’ Trinity College, Dublin; the expenses of printing were equally divided between himself and the college. It will doubtless always remain the most interesting treatise on modern and mediæval Irish as a spoken tongue, and as it is found in the literature of the last six centuries. It is full of admirable examples, but it does not attempt to investigate fully the earliest grammatical forms of the language, nor to demonstrate the relation of Irish to other tongues. A small ‘Primer of the Irish Language’ was published at the same time. O'Donovan was called to the Irish bar in 1847, having entered at Gray's Inn, London, on 15 April 1844 (Foster, Gray's Inn Register, p. 466).
The ‘Annala Rioghachta Eireann,’ or ‘Annals of the Four Masters,’ in seven volumes 4to, began to appear in 1848, and the edition was completed in 1851. This is O'Donovan's greatest work. The ‘Annals’ were compiled in the reign of Charles I by Michael O'Clery [q. v.] and a company of Irish Franciscans. Dr. Charles O'Conor (1764–1828) [q. v.] had published an imperfect edition of these annals up to the year 1171, and, as the original manuscript of this part was not accessible, O'Donovan corrected and retranslated this edition. From 1171 to 1616 he took his text from the autograph manuscript of the authors preserved in the Royal Irish Academy. The translation is excellent, and the notes astonishing in their width of knowledge and in the historical acumen which they display. The publishers, Messrs. Hodges & Smith of Dublin, who undertook the risk of the publication, carried it out with genuine public spirit. The Irish type in which the text is printed was designed by George Petrie. It is not too much to say that nearly all information on the historical topography of Ireland to be found in subsequent publications on the country is drawn from the notes to this work. O'Donovan was given the degree of LL.D. by the university of Dublin. He was employed in 1852 by the commission for the publication of the ancient laws of Ireland, and this work was thereafter his chief source of income. He made transcripts of legal manuscripts in Irish which fill nine volumes of 2,491 pages, and a preliminary translation of these in twelve volumes. He did not live to edit any part. The four volumes of the ‘Senchus Mór,’ and other ancient treatises which have been published since 1865, give no idea of what the work might have been had O'Donovan lived to edit it. But that these laws are before the learned world at all in a form capable of use, by such writers as Sir Henry Maine (‘Ancient Law’), is due to the preliminary exertions of O'Donovan and O'Curry. Fragments of manuscripts and translations by O'Donovan are to be found in the works of many minor editors, for he was generous to every one who cared for his subject. He prepared, in 1843, a text and translation of the ‘Sanas Chormaic,’ a glossary by Cormac (836–908) [q. v.], bishop of Cashel. This work of much difficulty was not printed in the author's lifetime. The translation was afterwards published by Dr. Whitley Stokes, with the text and with additional articles transcribed from another manuscript, as well as full philological notes by Dr. Stokes. O'Donovan wrote a supplement to O'Reilly's ‘Irish Dictionary,’ which was published after his death, and has been much used by scholars.
O'Donovan, who was a devout Roman catholic of no narrow views, was an intimate friend of Eugene O'Curry [q. v.], and he married O'Curry's sister. Thenceforth he lived in close relations with George Petrie [q. v.], Dr. James Henthorn Todd, Dr. William Reeves, and other leading Irish scholars of his time. He died in Dublin on 9 Dec. 1861, and is buried in Glasnevin cemetery, near Dublin. His son, Edmund O'Donovan [q. v.], is separately noticed.
No one man has done so much for native Irish history as O'Donovan; in Irish historical topography no writer, ancient or modern, approaches him, and all students of the Irish language know how much he has done to elucidate its difficulties and to set forth its peculiarities. He wrote a beautifully clear Irish hand, of which a facsimile may be seen in O'Curry's ‘Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Irish History.’
[Works; Ancient Laws of Ireland; Senchus Mór, Dublin, 1865; Lady Ferguson's Life of Bishop Reeves, London, 1893; Webb's Compendium of Irish Biography, Dublin, 1878; Memoir by J. T. Gilbert; Annala Rioghachta Eireann, vi. 2160, where O'Donovan relates the whole history of his family.]
O'DUANE, CORNELIUS (1583–1612), bishop of Down and Connor. [See O'Devany.]
