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In 1154 the Pope gave King Henry II of England permission to invade Ireland and bring the Irish church into line. Henry did not act on this until 1165 when Dermot Mac Murrough, King of Leinster sought his help. Dermot had been expelled from Ireland after he lost out in a typical Irish dynastic struggle. Dermot had lost a war with Rory O'Connor, King of Connaught and High King of Ireland and his ally Tiernan O'Rourke, King of Breffni (modern Cavan and Leitrim). Henry gave Dermot permission to recruit Norman soldiers to help him regain his lands in Ireland. Dermot found the men he wanted on the marches of south Wales, where the Barons were out of favour with Henry. Because they came from Wales, many historians prefer to use the term Cambro-Norman rather than the more common Anglo-Norman, in the interests of accuracy.
In May 1169 an advanced party of Normans under the command of Robert FitzStephen landed at Bannow Bay, in Co Wexford. With their help Dermot quickly regained control of Leinster and captured the Viking town of Wexford. In August 1170 Richard FitzGilbert (know as Strongbow) arrived with a larger force and captured the Viking town of Waterford. Dermot's daughter Aoife married Strongbow. In September the Normans stormed Dublin, they then invaded Meath and attacked Breffni. In May 1171 Dermot died without a male heir, which left Strongbow as ruler of Leinster.
After the capture of Dublin King Henry, decided to curb the growing power of Strongbow and minimise the possibility that Strongbow might set-up an independent Kingdom in Ireland. In October 1171 he landed at Waterford. In return for his submission Strongbow was granted Leinster. To act as a counterbalance Henry granted other parcels of land to the remainder of Strongbow's knights. Meath went to Hugh de Lacy and in Munster Milo de Cogan assumed lands to the west of Cork harbour while Fitzstephen was granted lands to the east of Cork.
Milo de Cogan (died circa 1183) was Strongbow's right-hand man in the Cambro-Norman invasion. He was granted a huge area in Co. Cork by Henry II and the great territorial family was thus founded. Though reinforced by grants to Richard de Cogan in 1207 and still of sufficient importance to be listed among the chief gentry of the barony of Kinelea in 1591, as a family of power it was practically extinct as such by the end of the seventeenth century. Minor branches of it, however, survive up to the present day, usually under the name of Goggin and sometimes Gogan. The original form of the name, de Cogan, derives from Cogan, a parish in Cardiff.
Patrick de Courcy, the second Baron of Kinsale, married the daughter of Miles De Cogan. Miles De Cogan ("the noblest baron in his time in Ireland" according to the Annals of the Four Masters) was killed in the battle of Athleathan, in 1316, in which Slemme De Exeter, lord of Athleathan who was in command of the English forces, was also slain.
John de Courcy who succeeded as the 18th Baron of Kinsale on the decease of his cousin, Gerald, the 17th Baron, marrried, first, Catherine, daughter of William Cogan William Cogan, M.P. for Cork County in 1585; and, secondly, Mary, daughter of Cornelius O'Cruly (or O'Crowley).
As time passed, the Barretts, Barrys, Roches and Fitzgeraids came to incur upon the holdings of the de Cogan family in Cork, as their fortunes declined. In 1405 it is given that the family was centred at Kerrycurrihy in Cork, and the name remained plentiful here into the 17th century as evidenced by the census of 1659. Records indicate that the family was centred at Barnahely Castle and Goolmore Castle even after the decline of the family in the 15th century. They are additionally tied to the castles of Aglish, Macroom, Crosshaven, Cullen, Ballyhea, Kilbolane and Rathgogan, among others.
The Birth Index of 1890 gives the Cogan family centred in Co. Cork. Cogane is given as a principal name of Cork in 1659. The family name has been traditionally linked to the district of Murragh in the Union of Bandon in Co. Cork.
In the sixteenth century the name was in a transition stage: the earlier Fiants gave as a rule Cogan, Cogane and Coggain, the later ones Gogan and Goggan. Among the Co. Cork place-names in the same source we find Goganrath and Gogganshill, the latter being also given as Knockgogan and a few years earlier as Knockcowgan.
The form Cogan, however, did not become obsolete. Philip Cogan sailed to Spain with del Aquila in 1602; two Cogans and a Coggan were officers in southern regiments of James II's Irish army, Richard Cogan was a "doctor of physic" in Co. Cork in 1707 and in 1798 Pascho Coggin was a witness to a deed relating to Charleville. Charleville, by the way, was formerly known as Rathgoggan - Rathgoggan, indeed, is the name of the civil parish embracing the town of Charleville. Another Philip Cogan (1750-1834), a composer of some note, was also a Cork man.
A very valuable study of the various families of Cogan has been made by Mr. Dermot Murphy, which was presented at University College, Cork, in 1957 as a thesis.
In addition to the Cogans of Norman origin there is a sept of the Ui Maine whose name is sometimes anglicized as Cogan, though Coogan is more usual and nearer the Gaelic-Irish form Ó Cuagáin. They are of the same stock as the O'Maddens.
The small sept of Mac Cogain (the Book of Fenagh and the Topographical Poem spelled it Mac Cagadhain), who were located in Glanfarne on the shore of Lough Allen in Co. Leitrim, dropped the prefix Mac in the eighteenth century and became Cogan and Coggan.
Neither of these, however, is at all numerous today. The variant Cogavin is also rare.
Matheson's Synonymes, published in 1901, mentions Cogan and Keogan as synonymous in Co. Cavan; and I have noticed in a Co. Meath will of 1834 the testator described as Cogan alias Keogan. Keogan, however, is properly quite a different name from those considered above. Woulfe, mentioning that it is Ó Ceogáin in the spoken Irish language, gives Mac Eochagáin as the correct Irish form of it, which is a variant of the better known Mag Eochagáin (MacGeoghegan).
Heraldry
Cogan
(The Anglo Norman family of de Cogan, descended from Milo or Myles
de Cogan who accompanied Strongbow to Ireland in the twelfth century
and was granted lands in county Cork) Arms: Gules three oak leaves
Argent. Crest: A talbot passant proper collared and lined Or. Motto:
constans fidei.