Kern (soldier)

A Kern was a Gaelic soldier, specifically a light infantryman during the Middle Ages.

Linguistic roots

The term is from the word Middle Irish word 'Ceithern' or 'Ceitherne', exists earlier as 'Ceithernn', and designated levied warbands used in Gaelic armies. These soldiers were, in any period, the lowest portion of the army, outclassed initially by 'Fianadi', infantry, and 'Cliarthairi', meaning guards or troopers who were the professional retinue of a Boaire. Ceithernn also, more loosely, means a 'warband' and can also be used to generically and simply mean a troop of soldiers, without distinction between various classes of soldiers involved.

During the Middle Ages, the English adopted the Middle Irish 'Ceithern' into the term 'Kerne', referring mainly to Irish levies, but also Highland Scots, who were initially difficult to distinguish from the Irish due to similar armaments and dress, prior to the invention and wider adoption of the kilt by Scots. In later times, Scottish forces serving in Ulster were collectively known as 'Redshanks' and were generally from Argyll and the Western Isles.

Military roles

Kerns notably accompanied bands of the mercenary Scottish 'Gallóglaigh' as their attendants and to fight in their bands as supplementary forces, where the Gallowglass filled the need for heavy infantry. This two-class "army" structure though should not be taken to reflect earlier Irish armies prior to the Norman invasions, as there were more locally trained soldiers filling various roles prior to this. The Gallowglass largely replaced the other forms of infantry though, as more Irish began to train to imitate them, creating native "Gallowglass"; although in a native sense that term is a misnomer, as it implies a foreign origin.

Earlier, the Ceithernn would have consisted of a myriad of militia-type infantry, and possibly light horse, likely remembered later in the "horse boys" that accompanied Gallowglass and fought as light cavalry. They would be armed from a dole or by what they owned themselves, and filled out numerous portions of an army, likely forming the vast bulk of most Gaelic forces. In the mid sixteenth century Shane O'Neill was known to have armed his peasantry and Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, outfitted many of his Ceithernn with contemporary battle dress and weapons and drilled them as a professional force, complete with experienced captains and modern weapons. [The noted Irish military historian G.A Hayes-McCoy, in his article on Irish military tactics, gives a detailed discussion on their training and tactics.
G.A Hayes-McCoy, "Strategy and Tactics in Irish Warfare, 1593-1601", Irish Historical Studies, No.7, Vol.2,1941,pp.255-279.] [Similarly, the kern are mentioned in Sean O Domhnaill's 1946 article in warfare in sixteenth century Ireland.
Sean O Domhnaill', "Warfare in Sixteenth Century Ireland", Irish Historical Studies, No.5,1946-1947, pp.29-54.]

Like many Gaels historically, Kerns often found themselves on multiple sides of conflicts; for example, the native Irish forces of the Norman-English in Ireland would have had levies of Kerns in them. As a result they also found themselves fighting upon distant shores in Europe where they were famous as ferocious light infantry. Indeed Desmond Seward is eloquent when he describes the Kerns in France:

The Prior and many of his men were killed. The kern had made a strong impression by their outlandish dress and their ferocity, riding back from raids with severed heads and even babies dangling from their bareback ponies. There were other Irishmen who, led by the Butler family, made a small but effective contribution to the Lancastrian war effort in France. The fourth earl of Ormonde – Fra’ Thomas was his bastard son – had been on Clarence’s chevauchee in 1412 and also took part in the siege of Rouen. Two more of his sons, Sir John and Sir James Butler (later the fifth Earl) were to be noted captains under Bedford and Old Talbot in the 1430s and 1440s. Besides a long-haired, moustachioed, saffron cloaked, barefooted ‘tail’ of javelin men and axe- and claymore-wielding gallowglasses, these Anglo-Irish chieftains would have brought more conventionally armed daoine uaisle (gentlemen) recruited from their relations. ["The Hundred Years War – The English in France 1337 – 1453", Desmond Seward pp 174-175]

Kerns in Literature

Notably Kerns appear in Macbeth:

:The merciless Macdonwald--:Worthy to be a rebel, for to that:The multiplying villanies of nature:Do swarm upon him--from the western isles:Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;:...:Mark, king of Scotland, mark::No sooner justice had with valour arm'd:Compell'd these skipping kerns to trust their heels,:But the Norweyan lord surveying vantage,:With furbish'd arms and new supplies of men:Began a fresh assault.:... :I cannot strike at wretched kerns, whose arms:Are hired to bear their staves: either thou, Macbeth,:Or else my sword with an unbatter'd edge:I sheathe again undeeded.

[ Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act 1 and Act 5]

References