Loígis
Laois · a people name, from the Loígis who were settled here as a border guard
Loígis, in English Laois, said LAY-ish. A kingdom.
County Laois. A people planted there to hold a frontier, who were still holding it a thousand years later.
The name
a people name, from the Loígis who were settled here as a border guard
Where
County Laois, between Osraige and the midlands.
In today's counties: Laois (Laois).
When it mattered
Under the Ó Mórdha until the plantation of the 1550s.
Tradition has the Loígis settled in this country by the kings of Leinster to keep Munster out, which is a very old arrangement: give a people land on your border and let their self interest do your defending.
The Ó Mórdha, the O'Mores, were the chief family, and the seven septs of Laois beside them. They were planted out in 1556, when Laois became Queen's County for Mary Tudor, and they spent the next fifty years refusing to accept it. The name came back in 1920 along with Offaly's.
What is left of the name
County Laois. The Rock of Dunamase, the Ó Mórdha stronghold, is still standing above the plain.
Names out of it
Families on this site that belong to Laois. A surname is not a pedigree, and plenty of people carry these names for reasons that have nothing to do with the old kingdom.