Murnane Coat of Arms, Family Crest and Murnane Family History

Murnane Family History

The family history of the ancient name Murnane was found in the irishsurnames.com archives. The name Murnane in Ireland is derived from the native Gaelic O'Murnain Sept that was located in County Limerick but which can now be mostly found in County Cork.

A sept or clan is a collective term describing a group of persons whose immediate ancestors bore a common surname and inhabited the same territory. It is also the case that many Irish septs or clans that are related often belong to a larger groups, sometimes called tribes. For example the 'Tribes of Galway' consisted of fourteen distinct families. The 'Tribes of Kilkenny' were ten families, etc.

In mediaeval times this name was sometimes rendered as Iwarrynane and also became anglicized as Warren. When Gaelic names were anglicized during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries they were often changed to Anglo equivalents that sounded most like their original Gaelic name. Over the centuries names were changed according to how they sounded and were pronounced with the same name often being both spelled and pronounced differently in neighboring towns and cities. Other anglicized forms of this old name include Murnan, Murnin, Marrinane and Marnane.The Murnane family crest (or coat of arms) came into existence many centuries ago. The process of creating these coats of arms began as early as the eleventh century although a form of Proto-Heraldry may have existed in some countries prior to this, including Ireland. The new more formalized art of Heraldry made it possible for families and even individual family members to have their very own family crest, coat of arms, including Murnane descendants.