From Ó Dobhailen, ‘descendant of Dobhailen’ — a Connacht family remembered in a 14th-century poem as ‘of good fame’.
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The Dolan certificate.
Digital €19.99 · Printed from €39.99 · Framed from €59.99. 20% off at checkout.
Gaelic Origin · Root name Dobhailen
Dolan anglicises Ó Dobhailen, ‘descendant of Dobhailen’ — though it is often written Ó Dubhláin and read as dubh, ‘black’, and slán, ‘challenge’, and the scholars disagree on which form came first. One line takes its name from Dobhailen, son of Gormghus, lord of Luighne in Connacht, whose death the Annals of the Four Masters record in 885; another was a branch of the Uí Maine in Galway and Roscommon.
A poem of 1372 remembered them as ‘O’Dolan of good fame’ — a reputation that has outlasted every argument over the name itself.
Irish form: Ó Dobhailen
