Mooney Coat of Arms, Family Crest and Mooney Family History

Mooney Family History

The Mooney ancient family history was found in the irishsurnames.com archives. The name Mooney is derived from the Gaelic O'Maonaigh sept name that is taken from the Gaelic word 'maonach' meaning 'wealthy'.

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.

These families are descended from Monach, son of Ailioll Mor of Ulster. Variants of this name include Money, Mony, Meeny, Meeney, Meany, Meaney and Mainey. There were several septs of this name in Ireland. The O'Mooney sept of Ulster were erenaghs of Shanaghan whose townland was called Ballymooney. Another sept was located at Tireragh in County Sligo. In that area there are four townlands called Ballymeeny. A notable bearer of the name was Father Donagh Mooney, who was a guardian of the young Earls of Tyrconnell and Tyrone at Louvian in 1626. Thomas Mooney (1815-1888) was editor of the Fenian newspaper in San Francisco and was a controversial figure in London.The Mooney 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 Mooney descendants.