Boylagh ( ga, BaollaighBoylagh
/ref>) is a historic

barony Barony may refer to: * Barony, the peerage, office of, or territory held by a baron * Barony, the title and land held in fealty by a feudal baron * Barony (county division), a type of administrative or geographical division in parts of the British ...

County Donegal County Donegal ( ; ga, Contae Dhún na nGall) is a county of Ireland in the province of Ulster and in the Northern and Western Region. It is named after the town of Donegal in the south of the county. It has also been known as County Tyrconne ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

Patrick Weston Joyce Patrick Weston Joyce, commonly known as P. W. Joyce (1827 – 7 January 1914) was an Irish historian, writer and music collector, known particularly for his research in Irish etymology and local place names of Ireland. Biography He was born i ...

said the name ''Boylagh'' comes from the territory of the

O'Boyle Boyle / O'Boyle is a :Surnames of Irish origin, surname of Irish origin. It is anglised from the Gaelic O'Boyle Donegal, Ó Baoighill/Ó Baoill. The clan was founded by a County Donegal, Donegal chieftain, Aneisleis Ó Baoighill, the grandson of ...

s. It was created along with

Banagh Banagh ( ga, Báinigh) is a historic barony in County Donegal in Ireland. Patrick Weston Joyce said the name ''Banagh'' came from Enna Bogaine, son of Conall Gulban, son of Niall of the Nine Hostages. It was created along with Boylagh when th ...

when the former barony of Boylagh and Banagh was split in 1791 by an Act of the

Parliament of Ireland The Parliament of Ireland ( ga, Parlaimint na hÉireann) was the legislature of the Lordship of Ireland, and later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1297 until 1800. It was modelled on the Parliament of England and from 1537 comprised two chamb ...

.1791 (31 Geo. 3) c. 48 "An Act for the Division of Certain Baronies of Great Extent in the Counties of Donegal and Meath" Boylagh is bordered by the baronies of Kilmacrenan to the north east, Rapboe South to the east, and

to the south; to the north and west is the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

Civil parishes

The barony contains the following

civil parishes In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority. ...

: *

Inishkeel Inishkeel () is a small tidal island and a townland off the coast of County Donegal, Ireland. The closest village on the mainland is Narin. Geography The island is located in Gweebarra Bay around 250 m from the coast. A sandy tidal bank ...

(also partly in barony of

) * Killybegs Lower (also partly in barony of

) *

Lettermacaward Leitir Mhic an Bhaird or Leitir Mhic a' Bhaird (anglicised as Lettermacaward) is a Gaeltacht village in the Rosses region of County Donegal, Ireland. The village, known colloquially as ''Leitir'' (pronounced ''letcher''), is between the larger ...

* Templecrone

Towns and villages

Settlements in the barony include Annagary,

Burtonport or (English name: Burtonport) is a fishing village about northwest of Dungloe in The Rosses district of County Donegal, Ireland. The main employers in the village were the Burtonport Fishermen's Co-op and the ''Bord Iascaigh Mhara Bord ...

, Doochary,

Dungloe ''An Clochán Liath'', known in English as Dungloe or Dunglow ( ), is a town in County Donegal, Ireland. It is the main town in The Rosses and the largest in the Donegal ''Gaeltacht''. Dungloe developed as a town in the middle of the 18th century ...

Glenties Glenties () is a town in County Donegal, Ireland. It is situated where two glens meet, north-west of the Bluestack Mountains, near the confluence of two rivers. Glenties is the largest centre of population in the parish of Iniskeel. Glenties has ...

, Kilrean,

, Portnoo, and Rinnafarset. Other features include the island of

Arranmore ''Árainn Mhór'' (English name: Arranmore) is an island off the west coast of County Donegal, Ireland. Arranmore is the largest inhabited island of County Donegal, with a population of 469 in 2016, but has had a gradually falling native popula ...

Features

The barony is thus described in the ''Parliamentary Gazetteer'' of 1846: :It includes the district of

the Rosses The Rosses (officially known by its Irish language name, ''Na Rosa''; in the genitive case ''Na Rosann'') is a geographical and social region in the west of County Donegal, Ireland, with a population of over 7,000 centred on the town of Dungloe, ...

in the north, and 12 inhabited islands, besides islets and insulated rocks, off the west coast. The estuaries of the Guidore and the Guibarra, the bays of Dungloe and Tyrenagh, and numerous unnavigable sandy marine inlets, cut its seaboard into a constant and intricate series of variously outlined peninsulae. A great undulating plain or champaign territory of granite constitutes its western district, and exhibits an irksome and almost uniform surface of dark peat, dotted with loughlets or ponds, and slightly variegated with patches of tillage around the cabins. Crovehy, whose summit has an altitude of 1,033 feet above sea-level, is the highest ground in this wild and dreary tract, and the small and utterly sequestered village of Dunglow, is almost the only apology for a town. The eastern district is a mass or congeries of uplands, cloven by glens and ravines This barony comprehends part of the parishes of Inniskeel and Lower Killybegs, and the whole of the parishes of Lettermacward and Templecroan; and its chief villages are Glenties and Dungloe.

References

From : From other sources: {{Donegal-baronies Boylagh