Qualla: Cavan https://qualla.com/cavan en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:12 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Cavan https://qualla.com/cavan Cavan: Introduction https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit 1591 Map of Cavan town, Public domain. The phrase 'the life of Reilly' did not come from nowhere. It came from here. Cavan town was founded around 1300 by an Irish clan chief called Giolla Iosa Ruadh O'Reilly, Lord of East Breifne, and his descendants ran their lordship so prosperously, with such a productive marketplace and such powerful patronage, that the O'Reilly name slipped into English idiom as shorthand for living well. The medieval marketplace they built drew merchants from Dublin and Drogheda. The O'Reillys also, less famously, allowed counterfeit English and Scottish coins to be minted in their territory. A life of Reilly, it turns out, was complicated.

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: 1591 Map of Cavan town | Public domain

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Cavan: The O'Reilly Centuries https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit Richard Webb, CC BY-SA 2.0. Cavan grew up around an O'Reilly castle on Tullymongan Hill, with a Dominican friary at its centre. The Dominicans were expelled in 1393 and replaced by Conventual Franciscans, but the friary tower still anchors the old graveyard on Abbey Street, and the medieval town's footprint...

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: Richard Webb | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-the-oreilly-centuries.mp3 0:06 2 full Cavan: Burned and Rebuilt https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit User: (WT-shared) Plug at wts wikivoyage, Public domain. In February 1690, during the war that followed the Glorious Revolution, Williamite forces from Enniskillen marched on Cavan. Their commander, Colonel William Wolseley, attacked the Jacobite fort at Tullymongan that overlooked the town. The battle was sharp and the consequences ha...

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: User: (WT-shared) Plug at wts wikivoyage | Public domain

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-burned-and-rebuilt.mp3 0:06 3 full Cavan: The Orphanage Fire https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit Richard Morgan Morganr, Public domain. Cavan's worst day came on 23 February 1943, when fire broke out at St Joseph's Orphanage. Thirty-five children and an elderly woman died. The public inquiry that followed found no formal culpability among the nuns who ran the home, but the questions never went away. Why were the ...

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: Richard Morgan Morganr | Public domain

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-the-orphanage-fire.mp3 0:06 4 full Cavan: Gulliver and the Aquarium https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit Andreas F. Borchert, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cavan has long claimed Jonathan Swift, who wrote Gulliver's Travels while staying at his friend Thomas Sheridan's house at Quilca, a short ride south of the town. The connection is real and the town has leaned into it. The Cavan Central Library, opened in 2006 beside the Courthou...

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: Andreas F. Borchert | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-gulliver-and-the-aquarium.mp3 0:06 5 full Cavan: The Fleadh and the Lakelands https://qualla.com/cavan/ Photo credit NTF30, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 2010, 2011 and 2012, Cavan hosted Fleadh Cheoil na hEireann, the great Irish music festival run by Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann. The 2010 Fleadh was the 50th and the first to be carbon-neutral, the first hosted in Cavan since 1954. Up to 250,000 visitors flooded the streets. Ab...

Read more: Cavan on Qualla

Image: NTF30 | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/d/g/cavan-wp/gcdg-cavan-the-fleadh-and-the-lakelands.mp3 0:06 6 full