Pádraig Ó Riain is an Irish Celticist and prominent hagiologist focusing on Irish hagiography, martyrdom, mythology, onomastics and codicology. Ó Riain has spent much of his academic life at the University College Cork, where he became a lecturer in 1964. Between 1973 and his retirement, he was professor of Old and Middle Irish. He has been a member of the Royal Irish Academy since 1989, president of the Irish Texts Society since 1992, and more recently, a member of the Placenames Commission of Ireland (An Coimisiún Logainmneacha). In the academic year 2000-01, he was Parnell Fellow at Magdalene College, Cambridge.