page_title: Kilflynn
section_title: History until 1900
hierarchical_section_title: Kilflynn / History until 1900
caption_attribution_description: English: A map of the civil parish of Kilflynn, Co.Kerry, Ireland, indicating its sixteen townlands.
context_page_description: Kilflynn is a village and a civil parish in north County Kerry, Ireland. It is 11 km north-east of Tralee just off the N69 road from Tralee to Listowel.
context_section_description: The first known human presence in Ireland after the last ice age has been determined as c.10,500 years B.C.
  When the original Celts of Ireland actually arrived is unknown, with suggestions having been made of between 100 and 5000 years B.C. from linguistic and other evidence. The late Neolithic Beaker folk introduced their cultural advances possibly from the Low Countries or from Iberia; this resulted in key changes and Irish becoming a unique Celtic language. Recent evidence shows a huge number of Irish men have the R1b DNA marker with similarly high percentages also found in other modern 'celtic' areas on the European Atlantic coast, including the Basque region. The first known farmers in Ireland or Britain landed in Kerry c.4350 B.C. but the incidence of their DNA markers is now very scarce, the R1b marker replacing it c.2500 B.C. This coincides well with the arrival of a dominant Beaker culture, including the introduction of copper mining and metallurgy in Kerry.
  In 2011, archaeologists working on the site of the realignment of the N69 Tralee-Listowel road found evidence for early Bronze Age and mediaeval activity in the townlands of Gortclohy and Cloonnafinneela. The Gortclohy dig provided evidence for tool usage from the Beaker period; alder charcoal from the site was carbon-dated to between 2132 and 1920 B.C. This is the most northerly evidence for the Beaker folk in Co.Kerry. The first Cloonnafinneela dig provided evidence of early mediaeval iron-working, with oak and alder charcoal carbon-dated to between 432 and 595 A.D. and further evidence of pit-kiln charcoal production 200-300 years later. A second dig at Cloonafinneela gave up evidence of various plants as burnt roofing thatch including rushes, cereals, hazel, oak and willow charcoal, the hazel dated to between 1450 and 1635 A.D.
  Kilflynn is in the middle of the area settled in the first century by the Ciarraighe (also Ciarraigh or Ciarraidh], the mediaeval tribe (from which the county name Kerry is derived) and claimed descendants of Ciar the son of the mythological queen Medb of Connacht  and one of her lovers, king Fergus mac Róich of Ulster.
  Prior to this the Velabri around Kerry Head and further south the Iverni people (or Iernoi from the earlier Greek) were noted by Ptolemy to be concentrated in the south-west area of Ireland, speaking the most primitive Goidelic language similar to Gaulish (as recorded on Ogham stones, with examples found close by in Knockbrack and Tralee, from the 6th Century). The Érainn, in Irish tradition, may be the name for the same group of people as there are linguistic links.
  Kilflynn was a historical civil parish in the barony of Clanmaurice. This barony developed from the area which had been in the control of native leaders (especially O'Conors) but was taken over by the Norman, Maurice, son of Thomas FitzGerald of Shanid who died in 1213. Thomas FitzGerald himself was son of Maurice FitzGerald, Lord of Llanstephan, who had supported 'Strongbow', Lord Pembroke, in his Cambro-Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169 and who began the Geraldine dynasty in Ireland and their House of Desmond. Later earls of all County Kerry were scions of the FitzMaurice barons.
  Kilflynn has sixteen constituent townlands: Ballyconnell, Cappagh, Castletown, Cloghaneleskirt, Cloonnafinneela, Crotta, Fahavane, Glanballyma, Gortclohy, Kilflynn (village), Knockbrack East, Knockbrack West, Knocknahila, Rea, Stack’s Mountain and Tooreen.
  The Stack family, also of Norman heritage, had their seat at Crotto (later known as Crotta) just north of Kilflynn and also owned surrounding townlands.
  Kilflynn had been known as Stackstown, and the name remains geographically in Stack's Mountains south-east of Kilflynn. The family landowners, namely James (owner of Garrynagore, Gortclohy and Cloghanaleskirt), John (owner of Aghacoora), Richard (owner of Killaspicktarvin (and more northerly townlands)) and Thomas Stack (owner of Gortaneare, Ballyconnell, Castletown, Crotta, Glanballyma, Knocknahila, Cloonnafinneela, and Cappagh) forfeited their landed possessions because
caption: A map of the civil parish of Kilflynn indicating its sixteen townlands.
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