 However it was also on the boundary between the kingdoms of Leinster and Meath that were occasionally at war.From the eighth century onwards, Clonard came under the control of various rival political dynasties, and by the mid-ninth century, it was the leading church of the Irish midlands.The abbot of Clonard led the clergy of the midlands in the same fashion that the abbot of Armagh led those in the north.