Race of Diarmaid, son of Cathal, son of Caomhan — Besides the anachronisms of this story, it involves a contradiction, for Diarmaid, son of Cathal, son of Caomhan, would have carried as much of the blood of the offending woman as his brother Aodh, if this wicked woman was the wife of the grandfather, Caomhan, which she would appear to have been, as Caomhan was the person cursed on her account. If she was the wife of Cathal, son of Caomhan, then indeed Diarmaid, who was liberated from the curse, may have had none of her blood, as he was the son of her Cumhal, or handmaid, but then this Cathal could not have been called O'Caomhain, as in the text, but Mac Caomhain. And again, if the wicked woman was really the wife of Cathal, there appears no reason for the saint's curse against Caomhan, his father, for the crime of his son's wife, and should he happen to have had more sons than Cathal, it would have been very unsaintly indeed to curse the descendants of them all for the bad temper of the wife of one of them. The story should be told thus by our author: — ‘According to ancient writers the following are the privileges of the race of Caomhan, son of Connmhach, which were obtained by Diarmaid, son of Cathal, son of Caomhan, from Ceallach, son of Dubhda, and from his son Aodh, as a compensation for the loss of the chieftainship, and in consideration of kindred. According to the Dumb Book of James Mac Firbis, Gerald, the Saxon saint of Mayo, with his three hundred monks, had pronounced a curse against the race of Caomhan, in consequence of the conduct of the wife of Cathal, the only son of Caomhan, for she had turned him, late in the evening, out of the door of Caomhan's fort, called Cathair Mhor; and the saint prayed, and while praying foresaw, that there should never be a king of the race of Caomhan, from whom the family were about to be named. When Aodh O'Caomhain, the legitimate son of Cathal, by his wicked wife already mentioned, heard this, he became sorrowful for the curse pronounced against the race of his grandfather, in consequence of the insult offered to the angry saint by his own ill-tempered mother, from whom all the legitimate descendants of Caomhan were likely to descend; he therefore visited the saint to remonstrate with him about the nature of the curse, in the hope of inducing him to revoke it. But though the saint listened to the remonstrations of this only legitimate representative of the house of Caomhan, and felt that it was rather a cruel case that a whole tribe should labour under a curse for ever, still would he not consent to revoke the denunciation against Aodh, the remonstrant, or any of the descendants of the wicked woman; but he consented to avert the effect of his malediction from Diarmaid O'Caomhain, the illegitimate son of Cathal by the handmaid of the wicked woman, because he had none of the blood of her who had insulted him. To him and his race St. Gerald wished the chieftainship of the tribe of the O'Caomhains only to be transferred, but not that any of his descendants should ever aspire to the chieftainship of all the Hy-Fiachrach. The chieftainship of the Hy-Fiachrach was then vested in the race of Dubhda, but the following compensations and privileges were ceded to the race of Diarmaid O'Caomhain, the illegitimate son of Cathal, son of Caomhan, in token of the seniority of his family, viz., that their chief should possess a tuath in each territory belonging to the O'Dowd, in the region extending from the River Robe to the River Cowney; that he should have the privilege of first entering the bath, and of first sitting down at the feast, and of taking the first drink; that he should be O'Dowd's chief marshal, pursuivant, and the commander of his forces; that O'Dowd should stand up before him wherever he should meet him on every occasion whatever; that all those who should take arms, that is, military weapons, for the first time in O'Dowd's country, should take them from the hand of the representative of Diarmaid, son of Cathal, son of Caomhan, and from no other person; that O'Caomhain should get the fine called the Luach leasa from every chieftain's daughter upon her marriage; that the O'Dowd should never be nominated without the presence and consent of O'Caomhain, who should first pronounce his name and walk thrice round him after his nomination; that after O'Dowd's inauguration O'Caomhain should receive his steed and battle dress, and that Mac Firbis, the poet of the principality, should receive the like from O'Caomhain. These customs to last for ever.’ For some account of the inauguration of the ancient Irish chiefs see Addenda.