Guild of One-Name Studies
One-name studies, Genealogy
Study: McIlveen
Variants: McElvain, McElveen, McElwain, McIlvain, McIlwain
Category: 1 - A study where research using core genealogical datasets and transcriptions is in its early stages.
Contact: Mr Paul McIlveen
I have been interested in the origins of my surname McIlveen and its recorded variants for many years. As a descendant of the McIlveen family from Courtbane in County Louth in Ireland I have developed a considerable amount of information in relation to bearers of the surname in the Fews area of Counties Armagh and Louth, but am in the process of expanding my knowledge of the surname and its variants in Ireland, Scotland and elsewhere. Much remains to be done, however, in terms of research into original records.
Family records in relation to my own family include the following variants:- McIlveen(e), McElveen, McAlveen, McAlvine, McElvine, McIlvine, McIlvain(e), McIlvein, McIlwain, McElwain and McElween.
Surname histories in Ireland add the following:- McGillavyne, McGilvine, McKilveen, McKilvine, Mackelwaine, McElwane, McElwean, McIllwain, McElvaine and Kilbane.
Surname histories in Scotland add the following:- Makgilvane, Mcilmeyn(e), McYlveine, Makilwene, Makilvane, Macywene, M'Ilvayne, MacIlmeine, M'Kilwein, M'Ilwyand, M'Ilmeane, Milmine, Melveen, Makilvene, M'Gilweane, McIlveane, Makilwyane, Mekilwaine, McIllvain, McElvain, McIllveyan, McIlweian, McIlweine, McKelvain, McKilweyan McKilwyan, and MacKilvand.
I am also aware of families in the USA who use the spelling McKlveen. There are vast numbers of anglicised alternatives from the Gaelic originals.
The name McIlveen and its variants derive from the Gaelic language. The 'Mac' prefix means 'son' in both Irish and Scots Gaelic and can be rendered in the English language in either country as Mac, Mc, or simply M'. Published sources suggest five potential origins for the recorded name variants - two Irish and three Scottish:-
IRELAND
Capt. Patrick Kelly connected the name Mac Giolla Mhín with Ó Maoilmhín and commented that 'they both originated with the same family, which, as indicated by local records and traditions, has existed in County Down since the 13th century and is of the same stock as the O'Mulvaneys' (1939, reprinted 1976: 91). No source was provided for this statement. Woulfe in his 'Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall' gave the earliest forms of the name in Ireland as M'Gillavyne and M'Gilvine, the modern forms being MacIlveen, MacElveen and MacKilveen (1923:377). He did not provide the specific sources for these early forms in Ireland but in his general introduction said they were nearly all taken from the Fiants of Elizabeth and the Patent Rolls of James I, which would place them within the period 1558 - 1625.
Woulfe said the name Mac Giolla Bháin was that of a family of the Uí Fiachrach formerly possessed of the townland of Lisnarawer in the parish of Dromard, County Sligo. He gave the early forms as M'Gilbane and M'Gillevane, the modern forms being MacGilvane, MacKilwane, MacIlwaine, McElvaine, MacElwain, MacElwane, Macklewaine, Gillivan, Kilbane and White/Whyte. John O'Donovan's 'Hy Fiachrach' provided the translation of Giolla Iosa Mor Mac Firbis's great genealogical poem which had been transcribed into the Book of Lecan about the year 1417. One stanza reads 'Lis na remur of hot roads, A land of beautiful water, Mac Gilli bhain obtained the land, Who vigorously entered the conflict'. In his footnote on these lines O'Donovan commented that 'the name is still in the neighbourhood, but always made White in English, that being considered a translation of Gilla ban, which means a white youth. In Scotland the name is anglicised MacIlwane, incorrectly for MacGilwane' (1844: 272-273). The Uí Fiachrach were descended from Conn of the Hundred Battles and were 'the race of the great Fiachra, son of Eochaidh' (who also fathered the famous Niall of the Nine Hostages).
The Muster Rolls of Ulster produced by William Graham between 1628 and 1634 provides the first comprehensive list of Scots and English settlers in the Province. 21 individuals bear variants of the surnames under discussion.
Trinity College Dublin holds copies of the depositions made by survivors of the Irish rebellion of 1641. The following individuals appear in record in the year 1653 in the County Antrim depositions -
Events in Templepatrick in Co. Antrim: Andrew McIlwyan (examinations of Woona Stephens, John White and William Magugen), Gilbert McIlwyan (examination of John White);
Events in Holywood, Co. Down: Andrew McUlven (described as a Scotchman in the examination of Daniell Mac Thomas O Gilmore), Gilbert McIllwyne (described as a Scotchman in the examination of Hugh McGee).
The County Armagh Hearth Money Rolls of 1664 include Thomas McIlvean of the lands of Grangemore in the Barony of Ardmagh.
Gilbert McIlveen (Senior) was a prominent merchant and banker in Belfast during the 18th century. The banking firm of Gilbert McIlveen & Co. was of great importance to Belfast and the north of Ireland from 1800 onwards. He died 1804/1805. Gilbert McIlveen (Junior) was the best known of his family. He was a member of the Society of United Irishmen and was one of the members of a secret committee which met with Wolfe Tone when he visited Belfast in 1791. He was a proprietor of the Society's newspaper 'The Northern Star' and along with others was charged with seditious libel in 1793. The trial did not come on until May 1794. Gilbert and the others were charged with being 'wicked, seditious persons, intending to stir up discontent and sedition, and cause it to be believed that there is not any government lawfully constituted in Ireland'. The jury found the proprietors not guilty. Gilbert did not participate in the rebellion of 1798 and it would appear from the sources that he had altered his allegiance by this time. He died in the early 1830s.
SCOTLAND
Ewen son of Alwine appears as a witness to various legal documents in Carrick dated to the late 12th and early 13th century, just around the time when surnames were forming in Scotland. The People of Medieval Scotland database refers to him as Ewen MacAlwine. The 19th century historian McKerlie says of him 'In the reign of King William (the Lion) between 1165 and 1214, we find in a charter in the Melrose cartulary, a witness named 'Ewine Macalewin', we think the same individual found in another, in the reign of Alexander II, between 1214 and 1249, as 'Iwane filio Alewain'. This is a name which still survives as M'Ilwaine.' In a later volume of his work McKerlie calls him Ewin MacIlwine. The names of Ewen's fellow witnesses include Gilbertus and Gilchrist sons of Kennedy whom POMS connects with Henry Kennedy who was killed by Roland of Galloway in 1185. The locus associated with Ewen is the area from south of Ayr to Dalmellington.
Black records Cuthbert Makelemwyn of the County of Lanark who rendered homage to King Edward I of England in 1296. His seal bore a mullet and S'Cudb. Machlivini. Although Black treats of him as a McMunn the anglicised form of his name is very similar to some of the variants used by the family from Grimmet. The mullet is a five pointed star which also appears in the Arms of that family.
Black records Thomas Makgilvane who was a tenant under Douglas in the Barony of Buittle in Galloway in 1376.
Alexander MacIlwaine and Duncan MacIlwaine appear in 1490 as witnesses to Precept of Sasine by Matthew, Earl of Lennox.
The Highland McIlvains appear in The Dewar Manuscripts, which contain a body of traditional history concerning the clans and lairds of the Highlands of Scotland in the period preceding the battle of Culloden. Richard Dorson tells us that, ‘One of the longest narratives sets forth adventures of ‘Big Malcolm MacIlvain’ of the clan Ilvain in Strath Eck, ‘renowned for his strength and exploits, and for being an excellent swordsman’. Among his feats Malcolm fights a black bull in Loch Eck and cuts off its ears. He wrestles and fells the notorious robber Nial na Gainne, and then asks the Earl of Argyll to set him free, offering to stand surety that Nial will rob no more. He steals another man’s wife and conceals her for seven years in a cave that he blocks with a stone seven men can not lift. Caught in a bog by a band of pursuers, he fights them off until his sword breaks, then defends himself with a piece of the sword until he has sunk to his hips, and kills the commander of his enemies with a blow on the forehead with the fragment of the sword. Captured and imprisoned, he escapes with a key his sister makes for him from an impression of the jailer’s key she obtained in barley dough; he lowers himself down a rope blanket and walks to a waiting boat, carrying seven stones of iron on him, each weighing twenty and a half pounds. In a subsequent episode he toys with and finally slays a champion Irish swordsman at Skipness. In his old age, dirty, ragged and bearded, Malcolm still throws strength-stones further than any of a group of caterans (cattle thieves) and by felling their captain seizes their cattle spoil. While the heroic death by treachery or against tremendous odds is not present here, most of the elements in heroic saga make their appearance: the single combats with beasts and men, with the hero always victorious; the lifting of enormous weights; the code of chivalry. Tales were also told about Big Malcolm’s grandson, Big John, who squeezed an arrogant fencer by the hand so hard the blood squirted from his finger tips and then threw him out of a window; as an old man Big John wrestled his son and a servant to the ground, lifted one under each arm, and tied them back to back with a horse’s halter' (‘Sources for the Traditional History of the Scottish Highlands and Western Islands’, Richard M. Dorson, Journal of the Folklore Institute, Vol. 8 No. 2/3, Special Issue: Folklore and Traditional History (Aug – Dec 1971), pp 147-84).
Most of the Scottish records relate to the family who were Lairds of Grimmet (just across the River Doon from Dalmellington) and who are recorded under various spellings of the name including the following - Makilvan, MacKilvand, Makilvene, McIlvane, McIlvain(e), McIlvean(e), McKilvane, McIlven, McIlvein(e), McIlvayne, McElvaine, McIlwaine, McIlvine, Mackilveen and McIlavain. John Patterson's 'History of the County of Ayr with a Genealogical Account of the Families of Ayrshire' published in 1852 gave an account of this family commencing with Alano Makilvane who had a charter of the lands of Grummet and Attiquin from King James V on 16th October 1529. Records in the National Archives of Scotland allow the adding of a couple of earlier generations back to Gilbert Makilvan of Grumet who is in record in 1505 and to one Neil Makilvan of Grumet who may have been Gilbert's father. This family were closely allied to the Kennedy family, intermarried with them and fought alongside them in the various feuds which were a feature of Scots society in the 16th and 17th centuries. They may be descended from Ewen MacAlwine (see above).
Back in 1989 I used the British Telecom and Telecom Eireann telephone directories to plot the modern distribution of bearers of the names McIlveen and McElveen in Ireland. Of the 119 entries, 55% were resident in County Antrim and 29% were resident in County Down, with 8% resident in County Armagh, 4% in County Tyrone and the residual 4% resident in Counties Londonderry, Meath, Westmeath and Dublin. The figure for County Antrim was inflated by the presence of the City of Belfast within its boundaries, which accounted for 69% of the County Antrim total. The distribution was concentrated in the southern half of County Antrim and the northern half of County Down with an extension into County Armagh. It was clear that the distribution had not altered significantly since Robert Matheson's research using the birth indexes for 1890. He noted 16 births in Ireland with only 1 in Leinster and the remaining 15 in Ulster; of the 15 born in Ulster, 9 were born in County Antrim and 5 in County Down.
In the same year I carried out the same research in the Scottish telephone directories and plotted the modern distribution of bearers of the names McIlvean, McIlveen and McElveen. Of the 40 entries, 47.5% were resident in Lanarkshire and 25% were resident in Ayrshire, with 15% resident in Renfrewshire, and just 2.5 % resident in each of the counties of Clackmannanshire, Inverness-shire and Stirlingshire. The figure for Lanarkshire was inflated by the presence of the City of Glasgow within its boundaries, which accounted for 37.5% of the Lanarkshire total.
Members of the McIlwain DNA Project at FTDNA are using Y-chromosome tests to define their father lines. At present, bearers of variants of the names under discussion belong to at least 4 different male lineages. Three of these are within haplogroup R-M269 and the other within haplogroup I-M223. I have utilised the STR and Big Y tests available to identify my genetic relations. My closest relations are testers bearing variants of the McIlveen name but my STRs and terminal haplogroup also connect me less closely to males bearing the surnames of Kennedy, McIlwraith and McCord.