The activities of the O'Donovan family and its various septs are poorly documented in the 14th and 15th centuries. Coverage of Munster affairs in general in the Irish annals is to be found very limited today because of large gaps in the surviving manuscripts and the total loss of many others. Anglo-Norman documents and church records are all that remain to be turned to, and while these preserve the occasional mention of a member of the family, nothing of its structure, political or internal affairs is offered. That the family remained at least locally prominent is proven by their providing a Bishop of Ross in the mid-late 15th century, but it is not until the 16th century that much more information, from a variety of new sources, many of them English, becomes available, and this for the most part belongs to the second half of the century.
