“Sept” is the word used in early Ireland to refer to a large family kin group, usually a collection of families with various surnames although descending from a single great common ancestor.
The smaller kin groups were referred to as “fine” (pr. finna or finny), and these were categorised in degree of closeness of relatives who shared a common grandfather (gel-fine), great-grandfather (derb-fine), or great-great-grandfather (iar-fine).
A sept was essentially a much wider kin grouping that comprised of several fine who shared a common distant great ancestor – who served as a progenitor of the tribe, so to speak.
The book is authored by N.C. Macnamara, a fine that descends from the Dalcasian sept, the same sept which Brian Boru descended from.
