KELLS, a market town of Co. Meath, Ireland, on the Black water, 94 m. N.W. of Navan by rail. Pop. of urban district (1926) 2,198. St. Columbkille's house, originally an oratory, was converted into a church, the chancel of which existed in 1752.
The present church is modern, with the exception of the bell tower, rebuilt in 1578. Near the church is a round tower, 99 ft. in height ; and there are several ancient crosses, the finest being that now erected in the market-place. Kells was originally a royal residence, whence its ancient name Ceanannus, meaning the dun or circular northern fort, in which the king resided, and the intermediate name Kenlis, meaning head fort. Here Conn of the Hundred Fights resided in the 2nd century; and here was a palace of Dermot, king of Ireland, in 544-565. The other places in Ireland named Kells are probably derived from Cealla, signifying church. In the 6th century Kells was granted to St. Columb kille. The town owes its chief ecclesiastical importance to the bishopric founded about 807, and united to Meath in the 13th The Book of Kells, an illuminated copy of the Gospels in Latin, contains also local records, dating from the 8th century, and is, preserved in the library of Trinity college, Dublin. It is asserted to be the finest extant example of early Christian art of its kind.
Neighbouring antiquities are the church of Dulane, with a fine doorway, and the dun or fortification of Dimor, the principal erec tion of a series of defences on the hills about 6 m. W. of Kells.
KELLY, EDWARD (1854-1880), Australian bushranger, was born at Wallan Wallan, Victoria. His father was a trans ported Belfast convict, and as boys he and his brothers were con stantly in trouble for horse-stealing; "Ned" served three years' imprisonment for this offence. In April 1878, an attempt was made to arrest his brother Daniel on a similar charge. The whole Kelly family resisted this and Ned wounded one of the constables. Mrs. Kelly and some of the others were captured, but Ned and Daniel escaped to the hills, where they were joined by two other desperadoes, Byrne and Hart. For two years, despite a reward of L8,000 offered jointly by the governments of Victoria and New South Wales for their arrest, the gang under the leadership of Kelly terrorized the country on the borderland of Victoria and New South Wales, "holding up" towns and plundering banks. In June 1880, however, they were at last tracked to a wooden shanty at Glenrowan, near Benalla, which the police surrounded, riddled with bullets, and finally set on fire. Kelly was severely wounded, captured and taken to Beechworth, where he was tried, convicted and hanged in October 1880. The total cost of the capture of the Kelly gang was reckoned at LiI5,000.
See F. A. Hare, The Last of the Bushrangers (London, 1892).