O'Driscoll - Irish Surname Origin & Meaning
Irish form: Ó hEidirsceoil
Meaning: “go-between, interpreter”
Traditional stronghold: Cork
Seafaring lords of Baltimore in west Cork.
Pronunciation: oh DRISS-kul; Irish Ó hEidirsceoil: oh HED-er-shkohl
History of the O'Driscoll name
The O'Driscolls descend from the Corca Laoighdhe, an ancient Érainn people who held south-west Cork long before the Eóganacht dynasties rose, and the name Ó hEidirsceoil comes from eidirsceol, 'go-between' or 'bearer of news'. Squeezed by the expanding O'Mahonys and MacCarthys, the sept concentrated around Baltimore, Sherkin Island and Cape Clear, where they became notable sea lords, levying dues on the foreign fishing fleets that worked their waters from castles such as Dún na Séad. Sir Fineen O'Driscoll backed the Spanish landing of 1601 and the sept's power ended with that defeat. The name remains intensely concentrated in west Cork, and its bearers still cluster around Baltimore, which holds an annual O'Driscoll clan gathering.
Variants: Driscoll · O'Driscol · Ó hEidirsceoil
Famous bearers of the name
- Brian O'Driscoll - Ireland's most-capped rugby international and one of the finest centres the game has seen.
- Sir Fineen O'Driscoll - The Rover, last great chief of Baltimore, who admitted Spanish forces in 1601.
- Dennis O'Driscoll - Poet and critic, author of the definitive book of interviews with Seamus Heaney, Stepping Stones.
Related names from the same part of Ireland: Murphy · O'Sullivan · McCarthy · Daly · Collins · Flynn · Healy · Casey