Among the Cenél Loairn it lists the Airgíalla and the closely related Uí Maine and the main royal centre in Ireland appears to have been at Dunseverick (Dún Sebuirge)- The O'Cahan family held the castle from circa 1000 AD to circa 1320 AD, then regained it in the mid 1500s. Lismore, in the territory of the Cenél Loairn, was sufficiently important for the death of its abbots to be recorded with some frequency. Applecross, was probably in Pictish territory for most of the period, and Kingarth on Bute are also known to have been monastic sites, and many smaller sites, such as on Eigg and Tiree, are known from the annals. In Ireland, Armoy was the main ecclesiastical centre in early times, associated with Saint Patrick and with Saint Olcán, said to have been first bishop at Armoy. An important early centre, Armoy later declined, overshadowed by the monasteries at Movilla (Newtownards) and Bangor.
Grey's abbey was situated in Co. Down, the Ards Peninsula, seven miles from Newtownards, at the confluence of a small river and the Strangford Lough in Ulidia. The Latin name of the abbey is Iugum Dei, which means ‘Yoke of God’ and which later became the deanery of Newtownards. Reeves' Antiquities of Down, Connor and Dromore places the Cenél Maelche, a sept of the Ulidians of Dal-Araidians or Dál Fiatach, near Moira (Mag Rath), county Down, or in Antrim, alias Monach. The Monaigh Uladh in the region of Downpatrick, which is located in the barony of Lecale (Leth Cathail, Galway). By Ptolemy, Downpatrick or ancient Saul was called ‘Dunum.’ As tradition has it the ancient Manaigh or Monaigh occupied the area near Lough Erne, giving their name to the modern county of Fermanagh. The Monaig are often associated with the Manapioi (Menapii), a maritime Belgic tribe of Cassel, Northern Gaul who are noted on Ptolemy's 2nd century map of Ireland in southeast Ireland. They spread northwards as the Fir Manach, or Monaig in Irish.
On the south side of the entrance to Belfast Lough is Bangor. St. Maelrubha-the Red Cleric, founded Aporcrosan (Armagh) in 672 in what was then Pictish territory, and was the monastery's first abbot, dying on 21 April 722 in his eightieth year. The Pictish name Aporcrosan was forenamed Applecross and the origin of the Isle Maree cult can definitely be dated to the stone circle, in ca. 100 BC. The cultus was important far beyond the Wester Ross Gairloch region, the foreigners were reported as participants in the ‘old rites.' laodh Maree... Craebh Ruad the Red Branch was a reference to an area in and around modern county Down. As St. Maelrubha was himself connected on his mother's side with St. Comgall, founder and first abbott of Bangor of the Irish Picts in the Ards of Ulster, the right to the abbeylands may at first have passed in the Pictish mode, and the O'Beollans acquired the abbacy by a female descent in the transitional ninth century.
Dalriada conquered the Picts and eventually overwhelmed them culturally. Dunadd, in Argyll, was probably the seate of the kings of Dalriada. Kenneth MacAlpin, a Dalriadan, was the first King of the united Picts and Scots, reigning from 840 to 857 as the king of Alba or Scotland. The Viking raids of the 10th century broke the sea communication between Ireland and Scotland and contact was lost with the western lands of Dál Riata, but not before the Stone of Scone was brought over.
Carrickfergus Castle is recognised as the best preserved Norman castle in Ireland and has guarded Belfast Lough since the 12th century. The Nine Years War (Irish: Cogadh na Naoi mBliana) during the Early Modern Period, in Ireland took place from 1594 to 1603 and is also known as Tyrone's Rebellion, was the last major struggle to preserve Gaelic Ireland.
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