Sweeney
Mac Suibhne · son of Suibhne
Sweeney is Mac Suibhne in Irish, said mak SIV-neh, and means son of Suibhne.
Suibhne means pleasant, which sits oddly with the family trade: they came from Scotland in the fourteenth century as gallowglasses, the heavy mercenary infantry the Irish lords hired by the hundred.
How it changes
- A man: Mac Suibhne
- His daughter: Nic Shuibhne
- A woman who married into it: Bean Mhic Shuibhne
- The family together: Mhic Shuibhne
Where it comes from
Donegal, Cork and Kerry
Also spelt
Sweeney, MacSweeney, McSweeney, Swiney
A name, not a pedigree
This is where the name came from, which is not the same as where you came from. Names were translated, anglicised, taken on by tenants and neighbours, and carried in by settlers who were no relation to the family that started them. To follow your own line, the 1901 and 1911 censuses are free and searchable, and give the county each person was born in.