User:Jnestorius/Irish placenames

Complex

 * Eng Cloneety < Ir Cluan an Fhaotigh "White's Meadow" which includes Ir Faotigh < Eng White [surname]
 * Baile na Lathach > Duckstown lathach unusual genitive of "mud" mistranslated based on lacha / "duck"
 * Móinín na gCloigeann Thuaidh/Moneennagliggin North or Boston village is officially Boston but townland has either name

Townland name uniqueness

 * Griffith ensured two townlands in the same civil parish never had the same name, if necessary adding parenthetical disambiguators.
 * He answered an EPPI question to this effect
 * Where a townland was split by a cp boundary, Griffith split into two tlds with the same name
 * What if these two ended up in the same DED? Did their names change?
 * When were islands erected into tlds?
 * This has resulted in at least one pair of same-named townlands Illaunroe in cp Killannin bar Moycullen, though different Irish names and in Gaeltacht: Oileán an Rosa/Illaunroe OSi "An t-Oileán Rua" and Na Rua-oileáin/Illaunroe OSi Na Rua-oileáin
 * S.I. 2004/872 has "Illaunroe Island [ED: Lettermore] (OS 77)" and "Illaunroe Island [ED: Lettermore] (OS 89)" with legend "The electoral division [ED] is given, and the county district [CD] when necessary, to distinguish placenames with the same spelling" although it's the OS 25-inch mapsheet that's given rather than the CD, which would be larger than the ED in any case.
 * I see that, whereas the SI lists Illaunroe under "townland", logainm now has a "townland, island or archipelago" label for them, whereas e.g. Castle Island, Skull is logainm "townland" and OS townland; maybe this is a recognition that the previous "townland" designation was incorrect?
 * Some townlands have two alternative names, e.g. Furnace or Bleankillew
 * Often one is derived from Irish (and provides the single official Irish name) while the other is of English origin [Bléan Choilleadh]
 * Counterexample: "Greenfield or Shanbally" → An Bhuaile Ghlas
 * Sometimes both are from Irish and
 * Sometimes both are translated "Dooncarton or Glengad" → "Dún Ceartáin nó Gleann an Ghad"
 * Sometimes only one is "Mulmosog or Altnagapple" → "Maol Mosóg"
 * In the townland indexes, one alias is cross-referenced to the other
 * In the townland indexes and OS maps, the "or" is typeset differently from the two aliases it separates: OS "or" is smaller, Index "or" is in italics
 * A question over interaction of alias and uniqueness:
 * I had thought that, if there were townlands "Foo" and "Foo or Bar", Griffith would make them "Foo (X)" and "Foo (Y) or Bar", not relying on the alias "Bar" to disambiguate. I though I saw some such.
 * But there is a counterexample: cp Cong, Co Galway has tlds "Cappacorcoge" Ceapach Chorcóige Thiar and "Ashford or Cappacorcoge" Ceapach Chorcóige Thoir: see OS 6-inch

Variant English spellings
"Inscribing Ireland : Place-names and the author/ity of the Ordnance Survey (1824-1846)" pp.108-114:
 * original guide was to enshrine the most commonly-used spelling; but
 * sources biased towards the élite, educated, well-connected, literate rather than the demotic, local, popular, oral
 * Larcom and O'Donovan favoured national standardisation of Irish etymological elements, which meant
 * might override local Irish pronunciation variant
 * folk-etymologies and other corruptions
 * Valuation Office and census accepted, but "failing to win the favour of government departments and institutions such as the Post Office"

https://amp.irishexaminer.com/ireland/vote-needed-to-change-nra-spelling-of-towns-in-clare-386752.html 2016 N67 Ballyvaughan, Ennistymon, and Lahinch being changed to read Ballyvaghan, Ennistimon and Lehinch.

Miscellaneous
Act of Explanation [17 & 18 Chas. II. c. 2.] which followed the Act of Settlement, has this [s. ccxxxiv.]
 * His Majestie taking notice of the barbarous and uncouth names, by which most of the towns and places in his kingdom of Ireland are called, which hath occasioned much damages to diverse of his good subjects, and are very troublesome in the use thereof, and much retards the reformation of that kingdom, for remedy thereof is pleased that it be enacted, and be it enacted by the authority aforesaid, that the lord lieutenant and council shall and may advise of, settle and direct in the passing of all letters patents in that kingdom for the future, how new and proper names more suitable to the English tongue may be inserted with an alias for all towns, lands and places in that kingdom, that shall be granted by letters patents; which new names shall thenceforth be the only names to be used, any law, statute, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding.

Points from Nash 1999:
 * Dublin Corporation c.1900 faced with '24 names of kings, queens and their families, 56 Lord Lieutenants, 96 nobles and other owners of property, various officials and celebrated persons' (Mac Mathuina 1992, 63)
 * Northern Ireland, the erection of bilingual signs was officially banned in 1947 was still legally prohibited until 1995
 * PW Joyce 1910 described as 'purely Celtic' placenames 'with the exception of about a thirteenth part, which are English and mostly of recent introduction'.
 * While arguing that the Ordnance Survey 'did little to repair the damage done by centuries of anglicisation' (Andrews 1997, 22), J H Andrews challenges popular simplified versions ... Placenames, he argues, were altered by English speakers through direct renaming and translation, but mostly by a process of Anglicization ... Andrews (1992) outlines five sources of toponymic change - substitution, translation, transcription from Irish-language documents, dictation and restoration - and argues that, despite recently becoming 'a metaphor symbolising all the cultural mischief done by Englishmen in Ireland' (1992, 11), translation was relatively rare. ... Irish names, Andrews argues, were not simply translated. New English names were introduced, but mostly for market towns, country houses, villages and farms newly established through plantation (Muhr 1992a, xii). ... While Andrews blames Friel for promulgating this version of placename history, it is possible to read Translations against the grain of its popular interpretation to reveal a more subtle approach than Andrews suspects. Instead, the play offers a more complex post-colonial cul- tural politics of language and location.
 * government issued circulars [1977 and 1986] and guidelines [1992] to local authorities ... development names are historically linked to the area being developed and that traditional local names are used wherever possible ... as Liam Mac Mathuina, an Irish language scholar, put it 'where cohorts of Hadleighs, Hamptons, Westburys and Westminsters team up with squads of Closes, Copses, Downes and Mewses'

Legal Irish names:
 * Act 1973/24 two orders:
 * SI 1975/133 all "post towns"
 * SI 2001/221 "An Cnoc" > "Cnoc Mhuire"


 * Inisheer is locally Inis Thiar but officially Inis Oirthir or Inis Oírr, which Ó Broin contends is due to a mistake by Roderic O'Flaherty in 1684.