Neill

The O'Neills, Irish Ó Néill, are the leading dynasty of the Cenél nEógain, the northern branch of the Uí Néill, claiming descent from Niall Glúndub, high king of Ireland, who died in 919; his great-grandson Flaithbertach first bore the Ua Néill surname. They long contested Ailech and Tír Eógain with the Meic Lochlainn, until Caimeirge in 1241 destroyed the rival line and left them supreme in Ulster.

From 1232 their chiefs ruled Tír Eógain from Dungannon, and when the Norman earldom of Ulster collapsed in 1333 the junior Clandeboye branch filled eastern Ulster.

In 1542 the crown recognised the chief as Earl of Tyrone, but Hugh O'Neill led the Nine Years' War against English conquest, submitting in 1603 and fleeing in the Flight of the Earls in 1607, after which his lands passed to the Plantation of Ulster. Dispossessed O'Neills later joined the rebellion of 1641 and served as exiled officers in the Spanish army.