Origin of the Name Grogan
The ancient history of the name
Grogan was found in the allfamilycrests.com archives.
Over the centuries Surnames developed a wide number of variants. Different spellings of the same name can be traced back to an original root. Additionally when a bearer of a name emigrated it was not uncommon that their original name would be incorrectly transcribed in the record books at their new location. Surnames were also often altered over the years based on how they sounded phonetically and depending on the prevailing political conditions it may have been advantageous to change a name from one language to another.
Variants of the name Grogan
include Groggan, Groogan and Grugan. This name in Irish is O'Gruagain and the latter variants are the anglicized forms of this. This sept came from Connacht.
A sept or clan is a collective term describing a group of persons whose immediate ancestors bore a common surname and inhabited the same territory. Irish septs and clans that are related often belong to even larger groups, sometimes called tribes.
The earliest record of the sept occurs in the year 1265 in the ancient document 'The Four Masters', this recording the death of Maelbrighde O'Grugain of Elphin. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries references to the name are plentiful but by the year 1550 the sept had dispersed from their homeland in Connacht. Several townlands were named after the sept, they being Ballygrogan in County Tipperary and Derrygrogan in County Offaly, near Tullamore. Today the sept is well spread throughout the four Provinces with Groggan, Groogan and Grugan being numerous around Omagh.
The Grogan coat of arms came into existence centuries ago. The process of creating coats of arms (also often called family crests) began in the eleventh century although a form of Proto-Heraldry may have existed in some countries prior to this. The new art of Heraldry made it possible for families and even individual family members to have their very own coat of arms, including all Grogan descendants.