Word.ws English Dictionary

flight of earls

flight of earls noun: the departure into exile of the Irish chieftain Hugh O'Neill and his followers in 1607.

Noun

flight of earls

  1. (Ireland, historical) the departure into exile of the Irish chieftain Hugh O'Neill and his followers in 1607.
  2. (Ireland, poetic) the mass emigration of the younger population in the 1970s and 1980s due to unemployment.
    • So farewell you boys and girls, another bloody flight of Earls, Our best asset is now our best export too.1987, Liam Rielly, Song: Flight of Earls
    • The 'flight of earls' theme with its various threnody on the decay of rural Irish life in song, ballad, play and fiction was everywhere […]1994, Brendan Kennelly, Dark fathers into light, page 40

Questions about flight of earls

What does flight of earls mean?
Flight of earls means the departure into exile of the Irish chieftain Hugh O'Neill and his followers in 1607.
What part of speech is flight of earls?
Flight of earls is a noun.

Words near flight of earls in the dictionary

  1. flight numbers
  2. flight nurse
  3. flight nurses
  4. flight of beer
  5. flight of beers
  6. flight of earls
  7. flight of fancy
  8. flight of ideas
  9. flight path
  10. flight paths
  11. flight plan

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: flight of earls (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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