Gilla Pátraic in Irish Genealogies Part I

The surname Fitzpatrick was, until recently, largely assumed to have arisen via the Normanisation-Anglicisation of Mac Giolla Phádraig, and that the Irish surname form belonged solely to one clan, of Ossory. Yet modern surname scholars now recognise the error of the earlier assumptions: Fitzpatrick was also a corruption of Ó Maol Phádraig, the surname of several distinct clans of Bréifne and Corcaigh (Breifne and Cork), and Mac Giolla Phádraig was the surname of several non-Ossorian clans. Both Ó Maol Phádraig and Mac Giolla Phádraig are derived from given-names, viz., Máel Pátraic and Gilla Pátraic, the modern forms of which are Maol Phádraig and Giolla Phádraig, respectively, and cataloguing the historical occurrences of those given-names is one method of gaining insight into the possible emergence of the associated surnames. This article is the first part of a review of the given name recorded as Gilla Pátraic in authoritative genealogies, which provides the context for when, where, and among which Irish population groups the surname Mac Giolla Phádraig may have emerged from an eponymous ancestor called Giolla Phádraig.