Place-Names and Family Names

Clare Island Survey. PLACE-NAMES AND FAMILY NAMES. BY JOHN MAC NE ILL. Read JANUARY 27. Published APRIL 30, 1913. THE list of place-names of Clare Island collected in this paper will, I trust, be found to have a scientific value from several distinct standpoints. The Ordnance Survey maps, do not aim at recording fully the topographical names for divisions of land less than townlands; there is probably no principle on which they act in inserting or omitting the names of smaller divisions.1 The townland names have acquired a sort of legal status, and thereby a definite degree of public recognition, and yet in many instances the division of the country into townlands has been a matter of arbitrary choice. Most of the townlands are, no doubt, divisions marked out and named by ancient tradition. In a large number, however, new names have been substituted in recent times for the old names, and even within living memory new townlands have been created at the will, apparently, of the landowners. For example, 1 have been unable to trace the name of the townland of Hazelbrook, in which I was once resident, at Portmarnock, Co. Dublin, in-any record earlier than 1840. Until about that time, the land now so named was part of another townland. How satisfactory the topography by townlands is may be judged from the fact that some of them contain less than 40 acres and others more than 4,000. In Clare Island, the townland of Fawnglass contains 75 acres 2 roods and 14 perches, and the townland of Bunnamohaun contains 1182 acres 1 rood and 3 perches. The Ordnance Survey map, on the scale of six inches to the mile, names no subdivision of the latter townland, which is about two miles long and one mile broad and comprises more than one-fourth of the island. Bunnamohaun now contains no human habitation, and consists almost entirely of rough grazing and waste land. But the name shows that part of it was formerly inhabited, since it means " the low ground of the cabins." It is further evident that this name has been artificially extended in signification. " The low ground " must have been the western side of the island, or a portion 1 The six-inch maps of Clare Island contain just one name, not well transliterated, of a smaller division, "Rooaunbeg." out of the many recorded in this paper; the much larger adjoining division, TtuAin til op, is not named on the map (Mayo 84). R.I.A. PBOO., VOL. XXXI- A 3 3 2 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. thereof; but at present the townland so named happens to include the whole ridge of Cnoc Mor, which is the highest part of the island. The Irish place-names, as they appear on the Ordnance maps, are often so distorted that the semblance of the originals is wholly obscured. The effort to represent the sounds of the names to an eye accustomed to English spelling comes often very wide of its mark. The majority of the names on the Clare Island maps are a record chiefly of the failure of an impossible task. Many of them can convey no even proximate notion of the sound to a reader of English, and are more likely to misguide than to guide a reader of Irish. It was doubtless the difficulty of dealing with such material that caused the Ordnance Survey officer to get confused occasionally, not only as to the forms of names, but also as to the places to which the names belonged. I note that in atlases for general educational use, place-names in Scotland, which are commonly spoken with their Gaelic pronunciation, are printed in their Gaelic spelling; and if this method fails to indicate the pronunciation to everybody, it yet secures historical accuracy. The other method, used in our Ordnance maps, fails in both respects.1 The scantiness of prehistoric and early historic structures in Clare Island has been noted in Mr. Westropp's paper (Part 2). The place-names bring under notice two sites, each named Sidhe&n, of which one, in the townland of Glen, is probably an artificial tumulus, and the other, near the lighthouse, seems rather to be a natural hillock. In both cases certainty could only follow exploration. The economic history of the island gathers a few facts from topography, and even a few facts are of more scientific value than any number of fancies. The general history and ethnography of the island cannot afford to ignore the rather remarkable evidence contained in the list of surnames. Professor Wilson, in his paper on " Agriculture and its History," Clare Island Survey, Part 5, has stated the problem, "How far were the older Clare islanders true Celts, and how far were they modified in blood and in economy and custom by the Norsemen ?" A large proportion of the family names bring with them a sufficient historical record to solve this problem— at least to the extent of enabling us to state it afresh on a structural basis of ascertained facts. Of true Celts, as a distinct race, ancient history and modern ethnology are alike ignorant. There is no Celtic racial type; and the only precise meaning that can be attached or ever has been attached to the name Celts is that it denotes a people whose language is or was Celtic. We have evidence that Clare Island once contained a population 1 The more accurate preservation of the place-names of Wales, besides enabling some dull folk to think themselves humorous, has greatly facilitated the study of Welsh history and archaeology. Clare Island Survey—Place-Names and Family Names. 3 3 largely, if not mainly, representing racial elements older in western Europe than the Celts. "We have also evidence, in Clare Island and the adjoining mainland districts, of almost incessant streams of immigration during many centuries, and these streams can be traced to many parts, not of Ireland alone, but of the continent of Europe, not in legend but in fully authenticated history. So far as I know, there is no evidence of any colony of Norsemen in or near the island during the period of the Norse migrations ; but the surnames bear witness to the presence in some degree of a later-coming Hebridean element which is largely of Norse descent. Some of the place-names will be seen to reflect bygone conditions of agriculture. Tuar M6ry the name of what remains of the most westerly village, means " the great bleachgreen." Another place is called na Tuartha, " the bleachgreens." The present generation in Clare Island has never seen a field of growing flax; much less has it had any experience of the spinning of linen thread or the weaving and bleaching of the linen fabric. Yet these things were familiar to every generation from the Great Famine back to a time much earlier than the first appearance of the Norsemen on the Irish coast. The " Parliamentary Gazetteer " of 1845, in the article on Westport, gives the following information on the authority of Mr. Inglis, who wrote in 1834 with reference to the linen industry :— " The linen trade in this district, and most probably in other districts, is the source of all the extras which are obtained beyond the absolute necessaries of life. The land is let in very small portions ; 7 or 8 acres is about the usual size of a ** take." Potatoes are raised for the family consumption; grain, to pay the rent; and the flax is destined for clothing and extras. The decline of the linen trade has produced great want of employment; and the condition of the agriculturists throughout these districts has very much deteriorated The linen trade was extensively carried on here; and eight years ago as many as 900 pieces were measured and sold on a market-day. Now the quantity scarcely averages 100 pieces. Taking the whole district, including Westport, Castlebar, Newportpratt,1 and Ballinrobe, about 500 pieces are sold weekly; and about 30,000 persons are supposed to be more or less employed in the trade. No trade gives such universal employment as this ; not fewer than 60 persons are employed, from first to last, in preparing a web of linen." The word govt, " a cornfield/' is of frequent occurrence among the place- names in the more cultivated parts of the island. The " Parliamentary Gazetteer" says of Clare Island: " Much grain is shipped for Westport; large quantities of sea-manure are landed; and about 340 men and boys 1 Newport, Co. Mayo. A2 3 4 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. divide their cares between farming and the fisheries." The working male population then was about equal to the entire population at present. From Westport, in 1835, the export of com, meal, and flour amounted to 14,624J tons. "Considerable shipments of corn were formerly made at Newport; but they do not now exceed 1,000 tons a year, most of the trade having been removed to Westport." Corn, like linen, has long ceased to be a staple article of commerce in the district of Clew Bay. The authority quoted makes no mention of the export of live stock from Clare Island at the period 1841-1845. In Mr. Kilgallon's account of the recent export trade, quoted in Professor Wilson's paper, p. 45, there is no grain or other tillage produce, only live stock and wool. Since 1845, the industrial civilization of the island, and indeed of the mainland for the most part, has been lapsing from the agricultural and manufacturing to the pastoral stage.

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