After the introduction of Christianity, the Irish kings and chiefs were buried in the abbeys, churches, and cathedrals: the Monarch Brian Boru, killed at the battle of Clontarf, was, it is said, buried in the cathedral of Armagh; the kings of Connaught, in the abbeys of Clonmacnoise, Cong, Knockmoy, Roscommon, etc.
It is stated by O'Flaherty, that six of the sons of Brian, king of Connaught, the ancestor of the Hy-Briuin, were converted and baptized by St. Patrick, together with many of the people, on the plain of Moyseola in Roscommon; and that the saint erected a church, called Domhnach Mór or the "great church," on the banks of Lough Sealga, now Lough Hacket; and that on three pillar stones which, for purpose of pagan worship, had been raised there in the ages of idolatry, he had the name of Christ inscribed in three languages: on one of them, "Jesus;" on another, "Soter;" and on the third, "Salvator." Ono, a grandson of Brian, king of Connaught, made a present to St. Patrick of his palace, called Imleach Ona, where the saint founded the episcopal see of Oilfinn or "Elphin," which obtained its name from a spring well the saint had sunk there, and on the margin of which was erected a large stone: thus from "Oil," which means a stone or rock, and "finn," which signifies fair or clear, the name Oilfinn or Elphin was derived, and which meant the rock of the limpid water.
O'Flaherty states that this stone continued there till his own time, A.D. 1675. A king of Connaught in the latter end of the seventh century, named Muireadhach Muilleathan, who died A.D. 700, and a descendant of the above named Brian, son of Eochy Moyvone, was the ancestor of the Siol Muireadhaigh; which became the chief branch of the Hy-Briune race, and possessed the greater part of Connaught, but were chiefly located in the territory now forming the county Roscommon: hence the term "Siol Murray" was applied to that territory. The O'Connors who became kings of Connaught were the head chiefs of Siol Murray; and took their name from Conchobhar or Connor, who was a king of Connaught in the tenth century. The grandson of this Conchobhar, Tadhg an Eich Geal or Teige of the White Steed, who was king of Connaught in the beginning of the eleventh century, and who died A.D. 1030, was the first who took the sirname of "O'Connor." In the tenth century, as mentioned in the Annals of the Four Masters, two or three of the O'Rourkes are styled kings of Connaught; but, with these exceptions, the ancestors of the O'Connors of the race of Hy-Briune and Siol Murray, and the O'Connors themselves, held the sovereignty of Connaught from the fifth to the fifteenth century; and two of them became Monarchs of Ireland, in the twelfth century, namely, Torlogh O'Connor, called Toirdhealbhach Mór or Torlogh the Great, who is called by the annalists the "Augustus of Western Europe;" and his son, Roderick O'Connor, who was the last Milesian Monarch of Ireland. This Torlogh O'Connor died at Dunmore, in Galway, A.D. 1156, in the 68th yeare of his age, and was buried at Clonmacnoise. And Roderick O'Connor, after having reigned eighteeneyears, abdicated the throne, A.D. 1184, in consequence of the Anglo-Norman invasion; and, after a religious seclusion of thirteen years in Cong Abbey, in the county Mayo, died A.D. 1198, in the 82nd yeare of his age and was buried in Clonmacnoise in the same sepulchre with his father.
In the "Memoirs" of Charles O'Connor of Belenagar, it is said, that in the latter end of the fourteenth century the two head chiefs of the O'Connors, namely, Torlogh Roe and Torlogh Don, having contended for the lordship of Siol Murray, agreed to divide the territory between them. The families descended from Torlogh Don called themselves the O'Connors "Don" or the Brown O'Connors; while the descendants of Torlogh Roe called themselves the O'Connors "Roe" or the Red O'Connors. Another branch of the O'Connors got great possessions in the county Sligo, and were styled the O'Connors "Sligo." --CONNELLAN.
