Seán Mór Seoighe

Seán Mór Seoighe, steward, stonemason, builder, ancestor of James Joyce and of many of the Joyce families of County Kerry, County Limerick, and County Cork, fl. 1680.

Biography

According to "a tradition, current among the Joyces of Acres, outside Fermoy, that in fact it was two brothers Joyce who had come to Kerry from the Kylemore-Ballynakill district close to Letterfrack" 1 in County Galway. One of the brothers was Seán Mór Seoighe (anglicised as Big John Joyce).

Seán Mór became household steward for William FitzMaurice, 20th Baron Kerry, who lived at Lixnaw, on the Brick river, south-west of Listowel. He appears to have been hired by FitzMaurice on the basis of being a stonemason and builder. Seoige oversaw the transformationn of Lixnaw Old Court and its associated buildings, and was given land to settle in the area. Over the subsequent six generations, the Joyce family proliferated and spread beyond Kerry into neighbouring counties of Limerick and Cork.

Family tree

  Seán Mór Seoighe, fl. 1680. 
     |
     |
     Risteard Caol Seoige
     |
     |
     Bernard Rua Joyce, fl. 1750. 
   = Brid MacAuliffe of Newmarket, County Cork. 
     |
     |
     Gearoid Mór Joyce of Ballyorgan, Athlacca, Co. Limerick.
   = Mary Ann Hogan
     |
     |_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _[exact relationship uncertain] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
     |                                                                              |
     |                                                                              |
     Roibeard an Gaelgoir Joyce, died 1828.                                         John Joyce
   = Ann Howard, fl. 1783.                                                         =?
     |                                                                              |
     |                                                                              |
     Garrett Joyce of Glenosheen, born 1796.                                        George Joyce, born c. 1776, south Co. Limerick. 
   = Elizabeth O'Dwyer.                                                            =?
     |                                                                              |
     |__________________________________________________                            |
     |                   |    |                        |                            James Joyce, born c. 1800, of Rose Cottage, Cork.
     |                   |    |                        |                          = Ann McCann `of Ulster'
     Michael (fl. 1898)  John Patrick Weston Joyce Robert Dwyer Joyce       |
     |                                                                              |
     |                                                                              James Augustine Joyce (only son), b. 1827, Fermoy.
     W.B. Joyce                                                                   = 
     |                                                                              |
     |                                                                              |
     Thomas Michael Joyce (1896-1958) of Pearse Street, Dublin.                     John Stanislaus Joyce (only son), 1849–1931
                                                                                  = May Murray
                                                                                    |
     _______________________________________________________________________________|________
     |                 |           |       |        |        |     |       |          |
     |                 |           |       |        |        |     |       |          |
  James Joyce    Margaret    John    George   Eileen   May   Eva   Florence   Mabel
    1882-1941.    

External links

• http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/j/jackson-joyce.html

References

• John Stanislaus Joyce - The Voluminous Life and Genius of James Joyce's Father, by John Wyse Jackson and Peter Costello, St. Martin's Press, London, 1998.