Fox Irish Family Gifts & Heritage

Fox in Ireland is the English translation of the Irish word sionnach, “fox.” In the midlands it stands for the Gaelic Ó Catharnaigh, “descendant of Catharnach” (warlike), a family whose chiefs were known as An Sionnach, the Fox. The same English form also translates Ó Sionnaigh of west Cork and Sligo and the rarer Mac an tSionnaigh, and every piece here carries the Fox spelling.

The Ó Catharnaigh descended from Maine, son of Niall of the Nine Hostages, and were once chiefs of all Teffia in Longford and Westmeath. Their ancestor Tadhg, called An Sionnach, was killed in 1084, and his byname gradually replaced the family name. Their lordship narrowed to Muintir Thadhgáin, now the barony of Kilcoursey in County Offaly, which Elizabethan records called “the Fox’s Country.” In 1526 Breasal, the Fox, sealed a written covenant with Mageoghegan of neighboring Kineleaghe. Centuries later the Dublin painter Kathleen Fox recorded the surrender of Constance Markievicz in The Arrest (1916).

The range sets the Fox family crest on the Irish National Tartan across a woven cotton blanket, an accent mug, a House of Fox garden flag, a ceramic Christmas ornament and a cork coaster set. For the road and the wardrobe there is a novelty license plate with the crest on the Irish flag and a T-shirt pairing the Fox name with an Ireland emblem.

Meet An Sionnach, the Fox of Kilcoursey, in our Fox Irish surname history.