Seaán mac Oliver Bourke

Bourke was the son of Oliver Bourke of Tirawley, grandson of Seaán Bourke, and a great-grandson of Ricard Ó Cuairsge Bourke, 7th Mac William Íochtar (d.1479). He developed his power base using gallowglass mercenaries, and by 1570 was regarded as the next Mac William Íochtar (Lower Mac Williams). He was created Baron Ardenerie in May 1580.[2]

Despite the contemporaneous culture of those of his class, he had little love for war and seemed concerned for the well-being of his people. Upon being reproached by an old woman for burdening his people with the maintenance of his Scottish troops, he lamented that without them, they would be at the mercy of their enemies who would be just as burdensome.

Bourke is rightly famous as the patron of The Book of the Burkes. He spoke Irish and Latin, but not English.

He died on 24 November 1580, and was succeeded, as Baron Ardenerie, by his son William.[3][4] As Mac William Íochtar, he was succeeded by his cousin, Richard "the Iron" Bourke, 18th Mac William Íochtar (d.1583), the son of David de Búrca, 15th Mac William Íochtar.

• Cokayne, George Edward (1910), Gibbs, Vicary (ed.), The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, vol. 1 (2nd ed.), London: St Catherine Press - AB-ADAM to BASING

• Knox, Hubert T. (1908), The History of the County of Mayo to the Close of the Sixteenth Century, Dublin: Hodges, Figgis and Co.
• Lower Mac William and Viscounts of Mayo, 1332-1649, in A New History of Ireland IX, pp. 235–36, Oxford, 1984 (reprinted 2002).
• Burke (de Burgh), John (Seaan, Shane Mac Oliverus, Terry Clavin, inn Dictionary of Irish Biography from the Earliest Times to the Year 2002, edited by James McGuire and James Quinn, pp. 38–39. Cambridge, 2010.