An Irish warrior who was once immortalised as a Disney prince has been honoured with another “funeral” in Spain, four centuries after his death.
An empty coffin representing the mortal remains of Red Hugh O’Donnell was paraded through the city of Valladolid in a horse-drawn carriage last week.
Red Hugh was the chieftain of a powerful Irish clan who attempted to drive the English army out of Ireland in the late 16th Century.
He died in Spain in 1602, while on a mission to ask the Spanish king for extra military support for his cause.
Red Hugh was buried in the city of Valladolid, which was then the capital of Spain.
Three years ago, archaeologists dug up a city centre street in an attempt to find the skeletal remains of the red-haired, eight-toed warrior.
Experts are not sure if Hugh’s bones are among the thousands they exhumed, but that has not stopped campaigners from holding elaborate funerals for him.
This year’s event took place on 9 October. Torch bearers in period costume accompanied the cortege as it wound its way through the city’s streets.
“What we were trying to do was to repeat the historical moment of the funeral in Valladolid of Red Hugh,” Carlos Burgos told BBC News NI.
‘A hero’
Mr Burgos is the president of the Hispano-Irish Association which has been at the forefront of a campaign to commemorate Red Hugh and his links to Spain.
He said the Irish chieftain was “someone who was very important, someone who was a hero, and someone who should be respected by us”.
So why does a Spanish city make such a fuss for one Irishman who died so long ago?
Hugh was chieftain of the O’Donnell dynasty and lord of Tyrconnell, a Gaelic kingdom in north-west Ireland which included what is now County Donegal.
As a teenager, he was kidnapped and held hostage in Dublin Castle, because of the threat his family posed to English power in Ireland.
Young Hugh eventually escaped, but suffered severe frostbite as he fled over the mountains and lost a big toe from each foot.
As chieftain, O’Donnell formed alliances with other Irish clans to notch up some significant victories over the English forces of Queen Elizabeth I.
His legacy was romanticised in a Disney movie – the Fighting Prince of Donegal.
“A reckless young rebel rocks an empire” was the tag-line for the 1966 film.
