Eleanor Plunkett

Turlough O'Carolan wrote this as a song in Irish for Eleanor Plunkett of Robertstown, County Meath, near his birthplace at Nobber. A family story says some thirty of her relatives died when they shut themselves in their castle, and she was the survivor. Donal O'Sullivan thought the tale was an exaggerated version of a 1641 report.

While Carolan was composing it, her coachman remarked that he had heard many of the same words in other songs. The insulted harper raised his staff at him and said nobody would ever hear any more of the song than he had already made. Edward Bunting collected the melody around 1800 but never published it.