The surname Kennedy is of Scottish and Irish originThe name is an anglicised form of the Gaelic name O’Cinneidigh ‘descendant of Cinneidigh’,a personal name derived from ‘ceann’ head and ‘eidigh’ armoured.The name thus meant literally ‘helmented head’,but was also apparently a byname for someone with an ugly or deformed head.Many present day Kennedys claim to descend from Brian Boru,the greatest of the kings of independant Ireland,who was killed at Clontarf in 1014 during the battle which finally destroyed the power of the Norsemen (or Danes as they are often called).The Scottish Kennedys became very powerful as this seventeenth century rhyme makes clear:” ‘Twixt Wigton and the toun of Ayr,Portpatrick and the Cruives of Cree,No man needs think for to bide there,Unless he courts with a Kennedie”.The name Kennedy brings to the mind of every American a feeling of patriotism and pride in ones country;in memory of the thirty-fifth president of the United States of America,John F.Kennedy (1917-63) laid low by the asassins bullet ; the first Irish president of America.The surname came into being in the ele…
Coat of arms: Argent on a chevron gules between three c…