Miler Magrath
Irish archbishop

The Most Rev. Miler Magrath (also Miler McGrath or Myler McGrath, Irish: Maolmhuire Mag Raith; c. 1523 – 14 November 1622) was a senior-ranking Irish prelate born in Carn, in the Gaelic túath of Fermanagh in Ulster, the northern province in Ireland. He came from a family of hereditary historians to the O'Brien clan. He entered the Franciscan Order and was ordained to the Catholic priesthood. The Vatican later appointed him the Bishop of Down and Connor in Ireland, but he converted to the Anglican Church of Ireland, becoming the Protestant Archbishop of Cashel. Magrath is viewed with contempt by both Protestant and Catholic historians, owing to his ambiguous and corrupt activities during the Reformation. He also served as a member of the Parliament of Ireland.
Early life and Catholic Bishop of Down and Connor
Archbishop Magrath was probably born at or near the village of Pettigo in what is now the south-east of County Donegal in Ulster (he was not born at the current Termon McGrath Castle, just outside Pettigo, as that structure was not constructed until circa 1611). At Magrath's birth, and during most of his lifetime, Pettigo and the surrounding 'Termon Magrath' lands, which included St Patrick's Purgatory, were part of Fermanagh (Irish: Fir Manach), a túath or lordship in Gaelic Ireland. Most of Fermanagh later became part of County Fermanagh.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Miler Magrath” is irish archbishop. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Miler, Magrath and Irish, not as a finished interpretation.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q532672. VIAF identifies the subject as 310665610. The Library of Congress control number is no2014108982. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1523, 1622 and 1611.
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This entry incorporates text from “Miler Magrath” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.