Deirdre (f)
A name of uncertain meaning, perhaps signifying 'fear', perhaps 'one who rages', or perhaps 'broken-hearted one'.

It was borne by the heroine of a tragic Irish legend. Deirdre, the betrothed of the king of Ulster, eloped with one of the three sons of Uisneach. All three sons were slain by the king, and Deirdre was left to mourn them.

Two prominent Irish writers have used this legend: W. B. Yeats in his Deirdre (1907), and J. M. Synge in his Deirdre of the Sorrows (1910). It was the name of a character with second sight in Nicholas Stewart Grey's excellent children's novel, Down in the Cellar (1961).