Desmond

The Earldom of Desmond was a FitzGerald lordship in southwestern Ireland, named for South Munster. The family’s Munster branch was known as the Geraldines. In 1337 Maurice FitzGerald, made earl in 1329, ruled its lands.

The Geraldines grew increasingly Gaelic and led the Desmond Rebellions against the English crown in the sixteenth century. The last earl was killed in 1583, his estates confiscated and his title suppressed. Later recreations of the title after 1600 carried no Geraldine lands.