Dunne

Language & meaning

Meaning & Irish forms

Gaelic Gaelic Irish in Ireland, chiefly from the Ó Duinn lords of Uí Riagáin in Laois; in Britain Dunn is also a separate English and Scottish name.^[1][2]

The name is built on the personal name Donn, usually explained as “brown”. Woulfe glosses Donn as 'brown' under Ó Duinn, and under Mac Duinn adds the senses lord, strong and dark. Wikipedia derives the surname from the common word donn, 'brown'.^[1][6][4]

Place

Where the Dunnes lived

How common the name was in each county, as a share of the population, in the three surviving full censuses of Ireland. Use the buttons to compare years.

Origins

Septs & territories

Many Irish surnames were adopted independently by unrelated families. These are the distinct Dunne lineages described in the sources.

A surname can point you towards a place. On its own, it cannot establish a pedigree.

The name over time

History

Lords of Iregan

The Dunnes take their name from Donn, 'brown', and their best-known family ruled Uí Riagáin, anglicised Iregan, in what is now Co. Laois. Woulfe describes them as a branch of the Uí Failghe, the kingdom that gave its name to Offaly, and as one of the leading families of Leinster. Iregan was the same territory as the later barony of Tinnahinch, which takes in Clonaslee, Rosenallis and Mountmellick. Around 1420 the poet Giolla na Naomh Ó hUidhrín was still praising Ó Duinn as chief of a warlike Uí Riagáin.^{[1][7][8][9][10]}

Descent from the Uí Failghe

Woulfe's account of Uí Riagáin traces the people to Riagán, who stood ten generations below Rossa Failgheach, the son of Cathaoir Mór, king of Ireland, from whom the Uí Failghe took their name. The kingdom of Uí Failghe survived until about 1550. Wikipedia reports that the historian C. Thomas Cairney counted the O'Dunnes among its chiefly families. A second, unrelated Ó Duinn family lived at Tara in Meath but, according to Woulfe, was driven out soon after the Anglo-Normans arrived.^[7][1][9][4]

Teige O'Doyne and his descendants

By the late 16th century English records spelled the name O'Doyne. Burke's General Armory names Teige O'Doyne, 'The O'Doinn', as chief of Hy Regan in Queen's County in 1590, and traces several later families from him and his brothers. The Dunnes of Brittas descended from his fourth son, Barnaby, and the Doynes of Wells in Co. Wexford from his eldest line, which produced Robert Doyne, Chief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas. A branch descended from his brother Terence was settled at Kilcavan in Queen's County.^[5]

The Dunnes of Brittas

The Brittas family, near Clonaslee, remained prominent landowners into the 19th century. General Edward Dunne of Brittas, who died in 1844, was the father of Major-General Francis Plunkett Dunne, MP for Portarlington and later for Queen's County and a member of the Irish Privy Council. In 1869 Francis rebuilt Brittas Castle as a castellated house; it was destroyed by fire in 1942, though a ruined tower survives. Burke notes that their descent from the chief of Hy Regan was certified by Molyneux, Ulster King of Arms, in 1660.^[11][5][10]

Dunne, Dunn and Doyne

Woulfe lists O'Dunne, O'Doyne, Dunne, Dunn, Dun, Doyne and Dyne among the English forms of Ó Duinn, so all of these may belong to one Irish family. The spelling Dunn, however, has an independent history in Britain. Wikipedia describes it as English and Scottish, most often from the Middle English dunn, 'dark-coloured', a nickname for someone with dark hair, and sometimes from Dun in Angus, a place named from the Gaelic dùn, 'fort'. A Dunn in a Scottish or English family is therefore not necessarily Irish.^[1][2]

Places linked to the name

• Tinnahinch barony (Iregan) (Uí Riagáin), Co. Laois — The barony that matches Uí Riagáin, the territory of the O'Dunne lords.^[1][8]
• Clonaslee, Co. Laois — Village in the Slieve Bloom foothills near Brittas, seat of the later Dunne family.^[10][8][11]
• Brittas, Co. Laois — Seat of the Dunnes of Brittas, descended from Teige O'Doyne, chief of Hy Regan in 1590.^[5][11]
• Tara, Co. Meath — Home of Woulfe's second Ó Duinn family, dispossessed after the Anglo-Norman invasion.^[1]

Everyday lives

The Dunnes in the census

Who the Dunnes were in the 1901 and 1911 censuses (and 1926 where recorded), set against everyone in Ireland in the same census.

Dunnes All of Ireland Ireland's figure marked on the Dunne bar

Given names

First names among the Dunnes

All three censuses combined. Top five in 1926: John, Patrick, James, Thomas, Michael; Mary, Margaret, Bridget, Annie, Elizabeth.

Spellings

Spellings

This page combines the spellings below, which census enumerators and families used for the same name.

Related forms

• Dunn — An English form of Ó Duinn in Ireland, but also an independent English and Scottish surname.^[1][2]
• O'Dunne, O'Dunn — Forms keeping the O prefix.^[1][4]
• O'Doyne, Doyne — Older spellings used by the chiefs of Iregan around 1590 and by their Doyne descendants.^[1][5]
• Dun, Dyne — Rarer English renderings that Woulfe also lists.^[1]
• MacDunn — From the separate surname Mac Duinn.^[6]

Diaspora

The Dunnes abroad

Emigration carried the name worldwide. In the 2010 United States census:

Source: US Census Bureau, 2010 surname file (public domain).

Heraldry

Is there a Dunne coat of arms?

People

Notable people named Dunne

• Francis Plunkett Dunne (c. 1802–1874)
  Army officer and MP who rebuilt Brittas Castle, the family seat near Clonaslee, in 1869.
• Edward Fitzsimmons Dunne (1853–1937)
  Mayor of Chicago and later governor of Illinois, the only person elected to both offices.
• Finley Peter Dunne (1867–1936)
  Chicago humorist whose nationally syndicated Mr Dooley sketches were written in an Irish brogue.
• J. W. Dunne (1875–1949)
  Soldier, pioneering designer of automatically stable aircraft, and philosopher.
• Irene Dunne (1898–1990)
  American actress of Hollywood's golden age, best known for her comedy roles.
• Reginald Dunne (1898–1922)
  Commandant of the IRA's London battalion, hanged for killing Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson.
• Ben Dunne (1908–1983)
  Businessman who founded and chaired the retail chain Dunnes Stores.
• Veronica Dunne (1927–2021)
  Soprano at the Royal Opera House, London, who became a renowned voice teacher in Dublin.
• Tony Dunne (1941–2020)
  Dublin-born left-back who played over 400 league games for Manchester United.
• Colin Dunne (born 1968)
  Irish dancer and choreographer, a principal lead in Riverdance from 1995 to 1998.
• Richard Dunne (born 1979)
  Republic of Ireland centre-back with over 400 Premier League appearances.
• Bernard Dunne (born 1980)
  Irish boxer who won the WBA super bantamweight world title in 2009.

Questions

Questions about the Dunne name

Evidence

Sources

1. Patrick Woulfe, Ó Duinn, in Irish Names and Surnames (1923)
2. Wikipedia, Dunn (surname) (2026)
3. Gaois research group, Dublin City University, Sloinnte na hÉireann (Gaois surnames database) (2022)
4. Wikipedia, Dunne (2026)
5. Sir Bernard Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884). Entries 'Doyne (Wells, co. Wexford)', 'Doyne (Kilcavan)', 'Dunne (Brittas, Queen's co.)' and 'Dunne (Ards)', and the list of Irish war-cries and mottoes.
6. Patrick Woulfe, Mac Duinn, in Irish Names and Surnames (1923)
7. Patrick Woulfe, Uí Riagáin, in Irish Names and Surnames (1923)
8. Wikipedia, Tinnahinch (barony) (2026)
9. Wikipedia, Kingdom of Uí Failghe (2026)
10. Wikipedia, Clonaslee (2026)
11. Wikipedia, Francis Plunkett Dunne (2026)
12. Census of Ireland 1901 and 1911, and Census of Population 1926, National Archives of Ireland. Counts compiled by surnames.ie from the irishcensus.com transcription (dataset 20260831130351). 1926 data © National Archives of Ireland, CC BY 4.0.

How we compile these figures: methodology.