Éimhear Mac Mathúna

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Heber MacMahon [ eːvəɾ məkmahuːnə ] (older Irish spelling Éimhear Mac Mathghamhna , anglicised Heber MacMahon , Latinized Emerus Matthaeus * 1600 in Inniskeen ( Inis Caoin ), today's County Monaghan ; † 17th September 1650 in Enniskillen , County Fermanagh ) was Roman Catholic Bishop of Clogher and a Confederate Irish Catholic General in Ulster.

origin

Mac Mathúna was the son of Toirdhealbhach (Turlough or Tirlough MacMahon) and Aoife Ní Néill (Eva O'Neill). He was a nephew of Pádraig Mac Airt Mac Mathúna (Sir Patrick MacArt MacMahon). The Mac Mathúna clan provided the kings of Airgialla (Oriel) from the 13th to the 16th centuries . The last head of the MacMahons and participant in the attempt to capture Dublin on October 23, 1641 at the beginning of the 1641 Rebellion , Aodh Óg MacMahon (Hugh Oge MacMahon), was his great-uncle. Mac Mathúna's father became impoverished due to land confiscations after the counts had fled and was driven from what is now County Monaghan to Killybegs ( Na Cealla Beaga ) in County Donegal .

education

Location of the dioceses Down and Connor (red) and Clogher (pink) in the ecclesiastical province of Armagh

Mac Mathúna began his training in the Franciscan Convent in Donegal . At the age of seventeen, Mac Mathúna went to the Irish College of the University of Douai in the Spanish Netherlands in 1617 . He later continued his studies with Aodh Mac Cathmhaoil at the Collegium Pastorale Hibernicum in Leuven . In 1625 he was ordained a priest and worked as a pastor in the local diocese of Clogher . On November 17, 1627 he was appointed apostolic vicar of the diocese by papal breve .

bishop

Fifteen years later, on March 10, 1643, he was installed as Bishop of Down and Connor on the recommendation of Archbishop of Armagh Aodh Ó Raghailligh (Hugh O'Reilly) . As Bishop of Down and Connor he took part in the Provincial Synod of Kells in March 1642, the General Congregation for the Clergy in Kilkenny in May and subsequently had a leading role in the Supreme Council of the Irish Catholic Confederation in Kilkenny.

As early as June 1643, before the episcopal ordination, he was transferred at the request of the Confederation and bishop of the more important, because more Catholic-populated diocese of Clogher ( Clochar ). During the 1640s he worked closely with Eoghan Rua Ó Néill , whom he had already met in Leuven, and established a connection with the papal nuncio Giovanni Battista Rinuccini after his arrival in Ireland in 1645. In 1647 the opponents of Rinuccini tried to eliminate Mac Mathúna from the Confederate by sending him a trip to France, but he refused to do so, referring to his lack of French and English. In 1648 he condemned the truce with Inchiquin as hostile to the Catholic cause. Since his efforts were fruitless, he withdrew with Eoghan Rua Ó Néill to Ulster, whereupon they were labeled as traitors to Ireland by the Supreme Council of the Confederation. In 1649 he was captured by Feidhlim Rua Ó Néill and imprisoned in Charlemont ( Achadh an Dá Chora , Co. Armagh), but he escaped two months later. In October 1649, Ormonde and Eoghan Rua Ó Néill came to an agreement in order to better resist the Cromwell invasion .

General and death

Enniskillen Castle . Mac Mathúna was imprisoned and executed here

After Ó Néill's death shortly thereafter in November 1649, he assured Ormonde of the continuing alliance. In December he organized a meeting of the clergy in Clonmacnoise . In March 1650 the military inexperienced Bishop Mac Mathúna was entrusted with the leadership of the Ulster army with 5,000 infantrymen and 600 riders by Ormonde. In 1650 Mac Mathúna took Dungiven ( Dún Geimhin ) and had some other small successes that encouraged him to finally take up the fight against Cromwell's forces under Charles Coote at the Battle of Scarrifholis ( An Scairbh Sholais ) near Letterkenny , although his officers were against it. Coote defeated him on June 21, 1650.

Although he was initially able to escape on horseback, he was captured two days later at Enniskillen and hanged on September 17, 1650 on the orders of Coote. He was also beheaded and his head impaled on display at Enniskillen Castle . His body was buried by Catholics on Devenish Island ( Daimhinis ) in Lower Lough Erne .

After his death in 1651 Philip Crolly became apostolic vicar in the diocese of Clogher, the next bishop was Pádraig Ó Dubhthaigh (Patrick Duffy) in 1671.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Heber MacMahon . In: Catholic Encyclopedia . 1913 ( Wikisource )
  2. ^ A b c d e E. B. Fryde, DE Greenway, S. Porter, I. Roy: Handbook of British Chronology , 3rd Edition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1986, ISBN 0-521-56350-X , p. 418.
  3. ↑ a b c d R. Bl .:  MacMahon, Heber . In: Sidney Lee (Ed.): Dictionary of National Biography . Volume 35:  MacCarwell - Maltby. MacMillan & Co, Smith, Elder & Co., New York City / London 1893, pp 225 - 227 (English).
  4. ^ Bishop Heber MacMahon (McMahon) . In: Catholic-Hierarchy.org . Retrieved March 25, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Mac Mathúna, Éimhear
ALTERNATIVE NAMES MacMahon, Heber; Mac Mathghamhna, Éimhear; Matthew, Emerus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman Catholic bishop, Irish rebel leader
DATE OF BIRTH 1600
PLACE OF BIRTH Inniskeen
DATE OF DEATH 17th September 1650
Place of death Enniskillen