Quoting.....Allan Griffith <[email protected] >I'd like to ask this Irish researcg group about the more common or more >likely spelling for two names from Ireland - I have ancestors whose >names are spelled many different ways after they reached the U.S. - so >I'd like to know what is the most likely spelling to find them under in >Ireland. Also where where else might a question like this be better >presented on Email ? > >1.) McGINNIS - (or McGinnes, McGennis, McGannis, etc.) > >2.) FOGERTY - (or Fogarty, Foggarty, Fogharty, etc, etc.) >-- >mailto:[email protected] (preferred address) ============ O'Fhogartaigh anglicized as O'FOGARTY. (But also will be found spelled in every imaginable way). A Tipperary name. See my Website for items on the Fogarty chiefs of old. ============= MacGuinness MacGuinness, together with its variants Guinness, Magennis, MacNeice, MacCreesh and others, comes from the Irish Mac Aonghasa, from the personal name Aonghas ('Angus'), made up of aon 'one' and gus 'choice', which was borne by a famous eight-century Pictish king of Scotland, said to be a son of the Irish god Daghda, and Boinn, the goddess who gave her name to the river Boyne. The surname originated in Iveagh, in what is now Co Down, where the family displaced the O'Haugheys in the twelfth century, ruling over the region down to the seventeenth century. The centre of their power was at Rathfriland. In the sixteenth century they accepted the Reformation, but joined in the later wars against the English and were dispossessed of all their lands. The name is now common in Connacht and Leinster, as well as in its original homeland of Ulster. A southern offshoot of the family adopted the variant MacCreesh, and in Monaghan, Fermanagh and south Down that name was used as an equivalent of MacGuinness. North of the original homeland, in Co Antrim, a similar process occurred, with MacNiece or MacNeice the variant adopted there. The Guinness family who founded the famous brewery were originally from Co Down. -------- In "Irish Pedigrees" by O'Hart, vol. 1; The GUINNESS or MacGUINNESS pedigree: CIONOG was the ancestor of MacAonghuis (aon, "excellent", gus, "strength"), anglicised; MacGuinness, magennis, Magennis, MacInnes, Guinness, Angus, Ennis, Innes, etc, The GUINNESS pedigree in vol. 2 says that Art Ruadh (roe) or Arthur Mac Guinness of Rathfriland, county Down, who is no. 124 on the MacGuinness pedigree of vol. 2 was knighted and assumed the name of Magennis. Sir Arthur MacGuinness in 1623 was created Viscount Iveagh which title he held till 1693. Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness, an oppulent brewer in Dublin was born in 1798. The Mac Aonghuis was chief of Clan Aodha, or Guinness, MacGuinness and Magenis. They had Baronies of Iveagh, Lecale and part of Mourne. They were Lords in Iveagh, Newry and Mourne. ========================= MacAonghusa Hennessy "Angus" (the god of love) Guinness ========= The GUINNESS chiefs are also on my Website. Patrick Traynor, in California's gold-rush country. [email protected] TRAYNOR'S Web Page (Irish stuff) http://members.nbci.com/pattraynor/