The first 1500 years: The Laigin Kings to the septs of Leix
Two thousand years ago, the country we know as Ireland today was divided into four kingdoms. The South Eastern province we now know as Leinster was at that time known as the kingdom of Laigin. Like its neighbouring kingdoms, Laigin's rule was the cause of frequent battles between rival tribes. One of the more successful tribes in the constant battle for power was the Ui Dúnlaing, descendants of a ruthless third century warrior prince, Dunlang, infamous perpetrator of many bloody deeds. Three centuries, perhaps a dozen generations and many battles later, Dunlang's descendants, the Ui Dúnlaing tribe lead by Illann macDúnlainge seized power of the kingdom of Laigin and maintained their rule there for the next three centuries until the middle of the eighth century.

In fact even though the Laigin kings of the four centuries that followed did not often carry the name, they all were descended from the Ui Dúnlaing kings up to and including the last and most notorious king in the dynasty, Diarmait MacMurchada, who in 1160 became the king to first bring the English Normans into Ireland in his bid to gain the kingship of all of Ireland. Rather than establishing rule over the entirety of the four kingdoms, MacMurchada succeeded instead in helping the English gain a foothold which later lead to a stranglehold on power over the country.

For the next six hundred years, the growing population of English aristocrats shared an uneasy rule over Ireland with a greatly divided group of Irish chieftans often at war with one another and more often rebelling against their increasingly powerful English occupiers. Among these chieftans, the territory to the North East of old Laigin, known as Leix, had become all that was left of the lands held by the descendants of the Ui Dúnlaing, known now as the O'Dowlings, and even the rule of that small region was shared by no less than seven family groups or septs, known as the seven septs of Leix: O'Moore, O'Kelly, O'Deevy, O'Doran, O'Lalor, O'Dowling and McEvoy.

After centuries of skirmishes and bloodshed, in 1609 the English under Oliver Cromwell finally cemented English power following some devastating defeats of the Irish chiefs and to secure their dominion over many leading Irish families including the septs of Leix, the English forceably migrated the leading members of the septs into far off lands of their former enemies in the neighbouring province of Munster.