Lynch, Patrick (Ó Loingsigh, Pádraig ) (1754/7–1818), schoolmaster and scholar was born 17 March in either 1754 or 1757, in Quin, Co. Clare. He attended a hedge school for his early education in Ennistymon, Co. Clare, where his teacher, Donnchadh ‘an Chairn’ Ó Mathghamhna, taught Latin, Greek, and Hebrew through Irish. He returned to his family home to work on the farm for five years before continuing his education at the school of the Rev. Patrick Hare in Cashel, where he worked as an assistant from 1774 to 1778.
He began his teaching career in 1778, and after a number of years as a private tutor became a schoolmaster in Carrick-on-Suir, Co. Tipperary. He stayed in this post for twenty-two years. He set up the first printing press in Carrick-on-Suir, and had his first book, Paddy's portable chronoscope, published there (1792). He moved to Dublin around 1808, and established a school at 30 Lower Ormond Quay. He became a member of the newly founded Gaelic Society of Dublin and was later appointed its secretary; he was also employed as one of the first people to work for the Irish Records Commission.
Lynch wrote widely and was a much sought-after editor by Dublin publishers. His grammar of English appeared as the first volume of The pentaglot preceptor (1796), a work in which he had planned to address Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Irish. Although that project was never completed, he later produced Introduction to the knowledge of the Irish language (1815). Other publications by him include The life of St Patrick (1810), The classical student's metrical mnemonics (1817), and A geographical and statistical survey of the terraqueous globe (1817). He also wrote the introduction to Practical astronomy (1817). He believed strongly in the use of rhyme as an aid to memory, and much of his work is written entirely in verse.
He met his wife, Mary (Mulhall?), in Carrick-on-Suir, and with her apparently had five sons and one daughter. One of his sons, William, was the author of A view of the legal institutions ... established in Ireland during the reign of Henry II (1830). Lynch died in Dublin on 10 May 1818.