Chapter 4: Eanach Dúin (Annaghdown) to Coill Beag

• Parish of Annaghdown
  
• Disaster of Annaghdown
  
• Monastery and Abbey
  
• Nunnery
  
• Bellhouse
  
• Annaghdown Castle
  
• Craobh Castle
  
• Kilcoona Round Tower
  
• St. Cuana
  
• Cloch-an-Uabhair Castle
  
• Lee's Island
  
• Cnoc Ferry and Coill Beag
  

St. Cuana, or Coona, who was born towards the close of the sixth century, as a son of Miodhorn, son of Dubhratha, son of Éanna, son of Niall of the Nine Hostages, the great King of Ireland. His mother was Meda, or Finneda, daughter of Fingen, a nobleman in the western district of Munster, and whose origin was derived from the tribe and territory of Corca Dhuibhne.She is said to have been the mother of four distinguished men, the first of whom, Carthach, son of Findall, was Abbot of Rathan, in Meath, and afterwards Bishop of Lios Mór, in Munster. The second, St. Cuana, whose festival and natal day is the 4th of February, from being a monk of Lios Mór, became "Abbot of the Monastery of Cill Chuana, in the western district of Connacht." He is said to have died about the year 650, and is reputed to have written a chronicle of his own time, or Annals of Ireland, up to A.D. 628; for Sir James Ware, in his "Writers of Ireland," thus refers to him: "Cuan or Cuanach, is an author often quoted in the Annals of Ulster as low down as the year 628, but not afterwards, by the name of the Book of Cuan, or Cuanach, from whence I conjecture that he was the author of a chronicle, and flourished about this time." There were, however, other Cuanas of a later date. In the fragments of his history collected in the Acta Sanctorum many prodigies are recorded, especially as to his manner of crossing the lake upon a flat stone with his followers from Gnó Mór; but it is also stated that he collected around him, at his church and monastery of Cill Chuana, a great number of learned Christian men, when the whole of this region, from Baile Chlair na Gaillimhe to Cong, was fertile with piety, learning and art.

The local tradition is to the effect, that Saints Éanna and Fursa, who gave names to the adjoining parishes, were sons of Meda, and brothers of Cuana, but the hagiology is not clear upon the subject. The saint's well, the Dabhach Chuana, formerly frequented by pilgrims, lies in the adjacent townland of Cnoc Réin.

Within the demesne of Ballinduff stands an old castle of the Skerritts, where a fierce contest took place in 1469 between Clanricarde and O'Donnell; and in 1586 it was held by "Mac Walter, called Thomas M'Henry."