Boho, County Fermanagh

Boho (pronounced /boʊ/ BOH, from Irish Botha, meaning 'huts') is a hamlet and a civil parish 11 kilometres (7 mi) covering approximately 12 km × 7 km (7 mi × 4 mi) southwest of Enniskillen in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. It is situated within Fermanagh and Omagh district.

This area contains a high density of historically significant sites stretching from the Neolithic Reyfad Stones, through the Bronze Age/Iron Age (Aghnaglack Tomb) and medieval (High Crosses) to comparatively recent historical buildings such as the Linnett Inn.

Boho parish has a high biodiversity of flora and fauna due in part to the niches offered by the limestone karst substrata combined with fen meadow, upland heath and acidic bog. The three mountains found within the parish; namely Glenkeel, Knockmore and Belmore provide a landscape varying from high craggy bluffs, with views of neighbouring counties, to low, flat bogland punctuated by streams and lakes. Below this landscape are two of the three most cave-rich mountains in Northern Ireland, featuring the deepest cave system in Ireland at Reyfad Pot, the deepest daylight shaft in Ireland at Noon's Hole, as well as popular caves for local outdoor adventure centre groups at the Boho Caves and the nearby Pollnagollum Coolarkan.

Boho is an anglicisation of the Irish Botha, which is the plural of Both, an old word for tent, hut or booth. This is a truncation of Bhotha Mhuintir Uí Fhialáin, Bothach ui fhialain in Breifney or mBothaigh I Fhialain, which translates as the huts of the Uí Fhialáin. The surname Ó Fialáin is sometimes rendered as Phelan.

This area has a long history of habitation as evidenced by the Neolithic Reyfad stones, dating from the late Stone Age/early Bronze Age (nearly 4000 years ago), classified as a scheduled monument. Further remnants of Neolithic habitation were unearthed by the Enniskillen archeologist Thomas Plunkett in 1880 when he discovered an ancient settlement 6+1⁄2 m (21 ft) beneath the surface of a peat bog (the coal bog) in the townland of Kilnamadoo. More neolithic remnants were unearthed in the townland of Moylehid again by Thomas Plunkett when he discovered the Eagle's Knoll Cairn passage tomb and Moylehid ring in 1894. Evidence Bronze Age habitation was discovered by George Coffey (1901), who unearthed a copper knife, currently on display in the Dublin collection. Iron Age artifacts were discovered in the Carn townland of Boho (1953), consisting of remnants of a hearth at the foot of an escarpment dating to first millennium AD. Later evidence of Danish raiders in the area came in the form of an iron spear head, found in a Cromleac in Boho, on display at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin.

The inscriptions on the Neolithic Reyfad stones constitute the first markings or writings from the Boho area, however their meaning has still to be deciphered. Thousands of years later, the region covering the Boho area was inhabited by the Erdini, Ptolemy (150 AD).

In 700 AD, the two predominant tribes in the region were the Cenel Enda and Cenel Laegaire, whose boundaries followed areas similar to Clanawley, and the Magheraboy. There was a third tribe in this region known as the Fir Manach but their territory did not cover the Boho region. At this time, the barony of Clanawley extended into the north of County Cavan. Later the Boho area was considered to be in West Bréifne, also known as Bréifne Ó Ruairc.

The Boho area was mentioned in the Annals of Ulster (628 AD), in which Suibne Menn of the Cenél nEógain kindred of the northern Uí Néill, reigning High King and son of Fiachra defeated his distant cousin Domhnall, son of Aedh (Domnall mac Áedo). This event was also described in The Annals of Tigernach (630 AD) as "Cath Botha in quo Suibne Mend mac Fiachrach uictor erat, Domnoll mac Aedha fuigit". In the first part of the 9th century the area of Boho or as it was written Botha eich uaichnich, was linked to the encompassing territory known as Tuath Ratha (Tir Ratha) and also to a local patron saint St Faber in the Martyrology of Oengus the Culdee Óengus of Tallaght