ireland settlement patterns of its surnames
TRANSCRIPT
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 1/14
Ireland: Settlement Patterns of its Surnames.
Edward Neafsey
August 1996
From the works of Woulfe and MacLysaght, I knew that Irish surnames are
often associated with particular localities. Many are of very long standing
and are probably as old as any surnames in the world. Yet I had not seen
distribution maps or core area definition or any data on numbers or
'market shares' in particular areas.
The idea of enumerating and mapping Irish surnames came to me when I
was working on trade area projections for new retail and leisure schemes
close to national borders. The proposed attractions would draw customers
over national and linguistic boundaries. Amongst other discriminators,
telephone numbers in the expected trade area were quite obviously a
good proxy for the neighbourhood and therefore the nationality of a
particular household.
Equally obviously, a phone code analysis could be used to enumerate and
analyse the distribution of individual surnames in Ireland. Results of the
1991 census for both the Republic and the North were coming on stream
and could provide a backdrop against which surname numbers could be
measured. Though the Republic's telephone directories were not available
on disk, as luck had it, the format of the directories meant that codes
could be scanned and put through optical character recognition. Results
could be adjusted to gross up for homes without
phones to produce numbers of total names per code area. The same could
be done for Northern Ireland. The
settlement pattern of any name could then be plotted on a map of the
whole island.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 2/14
This overview has been made possible by the introduction of the personal
computer. It could not technically have been done earlier than 1989 and
probably not before 1994.
I have now enumerated and plotted the distribution of about 200
surnames in Ireland. Though there are, according to MacLysaght, 4,000
Irish surnames, the 200 so far analysed account for a quarter of all the 1.5
million households in Ireland. I am getting insights from the maps that are
new to me and maybe are new to other people. This article sets out some
of the findings.
Perhaps the most surprising aspect to a casual onlooker is the fact that
surnames are not evenly distributed through the country. Even names
such as Smith and Clark are regional. Some Irish names go back 900 or
1,000 years. Why then have they not permeated throughout the entire
country? How many generations have we had since surnames were
adopted? How many does it take to get a dispersal?
If we go back far enough, lineage and nationality merge. The 5000 year
story of Céide Fields in Co. Mayo can be used to provide a perspective. We
are told that the 5000 years that have elapsed since Céide walls were
built and that this means 200 generations of people. A hundred years
therefore means four generations and 900 years means 36 generations.
Is 36 generations a lot? A botanist might say that the number of human
generations to a century is small compared to many species of animals
and plants and that 36 generations is not been much time for dispersal.
The dispersal we see may be as much as we could reasonably have
expected.
Against this is the fact that human populations in historic times havehardly ever been in equilibrium. They have, with occasional setbacks,
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 3/14
grown. The surname that I have entered recorded history in the eleventh
century, along with many other Irish surnames. That is also when the
Normans brought their surnames out of Normandy. A hundred ago - four
generations ago - there were eight people who came together to become
my great-grandparents. A hundred before them there were 64 who weretheir great-grandparents. Continue back through the nine hundred years
to the eleventh and I have 134 million ancestors! So has everybody else.
Yet in the eleventh century Ireland had only 400,000 people, and the
British Isles as a whole had only 2.5 million. Bring in Normandy, and even
Scandinavia for the Vikings and there would still be under five million. So,
if we could track them all, within a small number of generations,
everybody would find the same ancestors on both sides of their family
tree and that they are related to everybody else in the same
neighbourhood. Looked at in this way, we are all related.
When I have mapped a name, I write a commentary, usually of about 300
words, covering its meaning and facts and figures about it. The names
have ranged in numbers from 16,000 plus households called Murphy to 20
called Cantrell. There have been enquiries about names even rarer than
this.
The effect of the Famine has been to diminish rural population numbersdrastically, though not everywhere equally drastically. Even so, the
distribution patterns of the individual surnames of Ireland remain distinct
and in many cases tightly clustered. The urban centres of Dublin and
Belfast have grown in population. This is the result of industrialisation and
also because these centres were internal destinations for migrants. They
are comparable with overseas destinations for migrants insofar as
surnames from many or all parts of Ireland may be found in them.
What I should like to do in this article is to select examples of different
types to see how they vary in their settlement patterns. These include a
'single ancestor' surname; a trade name; a gallowglass; an Anglo-Norman;
and a surname based on a saint's name.
Gallagher families are said to be descended from a single ancestor.
Gallagher means 'foreign help' but is nevertheless amongst the oldest
Irish surnames. Taking the Gallagher settlement pattern as an example of the clustering of Irish surnames, this cluster has abrupt boundaries and
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 4/14
the question arises as to why this should be so. (Ten dots on the map
represent 1%of the families.) The surname accounts for about 5% of the
total number of households in Co. Donegal. If everyone is related and
surnames are up to 900 years old, why are Gallagher names not dispersed
evenly throughout the country by now?
Whilst 5% is a high proportion, each generation would be able to find
marriage partners amongst the other 95% without much need for
dispersal. Further, some even of Gallagher neighbours would be
'unrelated'. Everyone had to marry outwith the bounds of consanguinity
which no doubt would mean some outward movement on the margins of
the cluster. But bonds of kinship, familiarity and culture must have caused
an 'undertow' to bring outlying names back into the cluster again, rather
than continue with the dispersal.
My own surname, in its English guise of Bonner, is even more closely
identifiable with Donegal than Gallagher. Logan, a much more recent
introduction to the country (from Scotland to Antrim) is much more
concentrated in one county than either Gallagher or Bonner.
Gallagher: 5,000 families.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 5/14
The boundaries of Donegal are apparent in Gallagher. Watersheds often form natural
impediments to movement and watercourses sometimes do. At the opposite end of the
country, the catchment area of the Barrow and Nore river system, whose watersheds often
coincide with county boundaries, seems to have contained the Delaneys, and the 800 strong
Bergin families. Much the same applies to the 9,700 strong Ryan name in the Golden Vale of
Tipperary. A curiosity of Delaney is that the meaning of the name seems to put the origin of
its families, if anywhere, in the adjacent river system of the Slaney. (Greater Dublin today
stands out with these as with many names, to rival or exceed the historic area of origin of the
name.)
Delaney: 2,000 families.
By contrast, some names are more widespread. In such cases, typically
there has been more than one location of origin. Kelly is not location
specific. This may be because its root meaning (of strife, war) could applyto participants in events anywhere in the country. Kelly is the most evenly
distributed name in the country.
Kelly is a name of a type which is presumably old. It recalls characteristics
or virtues of an era that may be called pagan or heroic.
There are many names of this type. Some, like Kelly, have meaningswhich are not location specific. O'Sullivan is 'bright eyed' (probably);
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 6/14
O'Connor and O'Neill mean champions. Some are location specific, if only
in a general way. Murphy is 'sea warrior'; McNamara is 'son of the hound
of the sea'; (the dog had qualities to be admired, like the bear, wolf, fox
and raven. The word for dog appears in the name of the Ulster hero Cú
Chulainn).
Kelly: 14,500 families.
Many of the names are just physical descriptions. What is striking about
names of this type, location specific or not, is their strength in the
southern half of the country and the large numbers of families that have
the names. Whilst it may be said that O'Connor is western and O'Neill
northern, the statistics confirm the importance of the south. O'Neill is
twice as numerous relative to the rest of the population in Carlow as it is
in Tyrone or Derry. An O'Connor sept of Ulster is now extinct. So names of this type tend to be southern and big.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 7/14
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 8/14
McDonald: 2,300 families
Perhaps reflecting the mixed Scots-Viking ancestry of the clan, McDonalds
are found all down the east coast, an area settled by Scandinavians and
having several Scandinavian placenames.
The Anglo-Norman settlement of the country brought more surnames to
Ireland, most easily recognisable being those with the Fitz prefix. The
most numerous surname from this settlement though was not originally a
surname. It was Walsh. This is the old English singular of Welsh, being the
name of unrelated Welsh retainers of the Anglo-Norman lords. Ireland now
has 12,600 Walsh families, the third most numerous after Murphy and
Kelly. The Walsh settlement highlights an area within which the patterns of
Anglo-Norman names proper typically fit. About 2% of the families of the
south coast counties have this name. Despite the early Anglo-Norman
presence in Carrickfergus, these names are proportionately not well
represented in the North.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 9/14
Walsh: 11,000 families.
We might expect Smith to be a widespread name - one in every village,
but it is not so. In part its presence in Ireland is due to British settlement
in Ulster, but in part it is a translation of the Gaelic McGowan. Historically
McGowan was associated with north Leinster. Smith now is found not somuch in a cluster, but in the whole country north of a line from Dublin to
Donegal. The map shows a composite picture of former McGowans
together with Smiths and Smyths from Britain.
Other names to do with trades or professions similarly are weak in the
south. Clarke, with a self evident meaning, and McAteer/McIntyre,
meaning carpenter or mason, tend to be within the area covered by
Smith.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 10/14
Smith, Smyth, McGowan: 11,000 families.
Moore like Smith, has origins in Ulster Gaels, and in Scottish and English
migrants. It is also the modern spelling of a Norman name and so is found
in the south. It is widespread, the result not so much of dispersal, but of
multiple origins.
What seems to be an overall pattern is that the south of the island is
strong on names from the heroic era, when virtues such as those in the
meanings of Kelly or Murphy were the admired qualities. The northern half
of the country has these names too, but examples there do not have the
numerical strength of the south. Apart from the trade names, the north
has surnames based on saints' names or on religion in other forms. This
became apparent to me when I plotted McBride. This is from St Brigid,
whose cult was in mid-Leinster. The families turn out to be concentrated
much further to the north.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 11/14
McBride: 1,700 families.
The North is where one finds Thompson, McComb and Holmes (from
Thomas); McMillan/McMullen (son of the tonsured one). It is also the
location of Mac names based on saints' names, whether scriptural orvernacular saints; and saints' names prefixed by 'Mul', devotee of, or 'Gil',
servant of.
Another observation to be made from the overview provided by plotting
surnames is the use of the prefixes 'O' and 'Mac' in Irish names. The
impressions one gets from MacLysaght is that British rule was
unsympathetic and so these prefixes were dropped, and that restoration
has occurred since British rule has ceased.
There obviously is a dynamic to be measured in the restoration,
particularly of the 'O'. Gorman is an interesting example. The name was
originally McGorman. The prefix fell into disuse. A celebrity with the name
erroneously assumed an 'O' and others followed suit. MacLysaght, often
working with data of a century ago, found that O'Gorman was found
chiefly in Clare, whilst Tipperary was plain Gorman. The distribution I find
today, which cannot be illustrated on a black and white map, is that Tipperary today is also O'Gorman country. The 'O' form is evidently
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 12/14
spreading from the south west. The present position is that 55% of the
families are O'Gorman, 43% are Gorman, and only 2% are McGorman.
The immense extent of the range of use of the 'O' prefix must cast doubton the influence the British had on this cultural feature. Generally
speaking, for an individual name, there are more families with the prefix
in the urban areas and the south. But the proportions vary from one name
to another, even in the same regions.
The extremes are Munster names. At one end of the range, 99% of Shea
families have the 'O' prefix. The Murphys, also in Munster, do not have it
at all, with the possible exception of people who write their name in
Gaelic. With Sullivan, 89% have the prefix.
In Leinster, 15% of Farrells have the prefix, whilst with their near
neighbours the Reillys, 62% do.
In Ulster, restoration of the 'O' prefix tends to be from west to east. Some
41% of the 3,000 strong Kane families have the prefix. Those with it are
mainly in the west. A paradox arises here when comparison is made withthe 3,400 Keane families, the spelling variant predominant in the other
three provinces. These families are further south, yet hardly any of them
has the prefix.
Whilst it is not a reintroduction, another paradox arises when comparison
is made with an example of the use of the 'Mac' prefix in Ulster. McCartan
remains solidly with its prefix in the south east, whereas Carton, Cartin
Carten and Cartan are the forms found in the north east and along thenorth coast of Northern Ireland.
This article set out with the intent of providing explanations of surname
distributions. It would however be misleading to leave the impression that
all distributions may be easily explained. O'Donovan is one of the purely
descriptive names from the Old Gaelic or heroic era. It is derived from two
Gaelic words: 'donn', brown, and 'dubh', black. The place of clan origin is
Co. Limerick, whence the O'Donovans were forced to migrate to southwest Co. Cork after the arrival of the Anglo-Normans.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 13/14
O'Donovan: 3,100 families
Donovan families are amongst those who have made a significant
restoration of the prefix. Referring to 1890s' data, MacLysaght put the
proportion of families with the prefix at only 2%. A century later, it is 77%.
Like many families, the O'Donovans are tightly clustered. In this case as in
many others, the reasons for the particular pattern are not clear from
either meaning or topography. The same pattern however is evident in the
Murphy distribution, though it is more fuzzy.
These then are the impressions I have gained from mapping Irish
surnames. Of necessity the treatment has to be inadequate. Each new
name mapped may change the context for some of the others. Space for
200 maps cannot be provided and even if it could, there remain many
more surname populations still to be mapped. Some may be mapped
more completely. There may be interest to be gained from mapping all
McDonald variants together insofar as that may be possible. Even alone,
McDonald shows that families of settlers from the Western Isles are as
dispersed as those from South Wales.
8/14/2019 Ireland Settlement Patterns of Its Surnames
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/ireland-settlement-patterns-of-its-surnames 14/14
It seems that some old names are tightly clustered, as are some new
ones, like Logan. Chronologically between the old and the new, some
names may be widely dispersed, like Walsh and McDonald. It seems also
that as one moves north, surnames have a finer grain and a greater range
of types of origin, even excluding names brought from Scotland andEngland.
In that many names turn out to be variants of other names, the subject
matter is more complex than it seems at first sight, but it does now lend
itself to quantification and analysis. We are fortunate with Ireland to have
the data and to have it in a form that may be broken down into small
areas, which is not so everywhere. Further, as time goes by, it will no
doubt be possible to map surname distributions from the Griffith Valuation
and so to make comparisons of movements between the mid 19th century
and today, for any name.
The Irish Genealogical Foundation published my ‘Surnames of Ireland’ in 2002. It covers 200 surnames.