No Jon Kilkenny couldn't be anywhere, and the writer I know definitely had been there many times, Dominic Behan. It's the old Medieval capital of Ireland and the only inland city. Beautiful city in the heart of Leinster in the south east. It's famed for it's black marble stone (hence the mention in the song)which fronts many of the city's pubs and churches, and most of the older stones in KK graveyard are made of Black marble which used to be mined in the nearby town of Castlecomer where I was born. Also the Rover in the song as the story has always been told locally was a Wandering minstrel, an English man from the north (not from KK) who made kk his last stopon his yearly rambles through the south, he hell in love with a KK lass and promised to return for her, it's unclear whether he didn't return or did return only to find her grave stone of Black Marble