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                 ‘When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl’.

–William Shakespeare.

One of the contributions made by trees in providing food was the many native apple varieties once available in Ireland. In autumn wild crab apples (Malus sylvestris) were collected in great numbers for jams and jellies. The cultivation of apples was also more common in the past, for both private and commercial consumption. Irish apple harvesting was never the major rural industry it was (and is) in the UK, with its long-established traditions in such counties as Devon, Kent, Somerset, Herefordshire and Gloucestershire. Nevertheless, there were pockets of the industry in Ireland, mostly in Munster – in Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Waterford and Clare. Many estates grew a variety of apple types in walled gardens or extensive orchards – dessert apples, culinary apples and apples for cider production. Apples were often from native cultivars, best suited to local growing conditions and resistant to disease. In Clare, cider apple cultivation was a viable business up to the late 1830’s.

James Frost, recalling that úll and abhal are Gaelic names for apple, wrote of townland names in Lower Bunratty in 1893: ‘We find four localities indicating the growth of apples, viz.: – Moy-ullaan, Moygalla, Gortnanool, and Drumullan’. These names suggest that apple harvesting was of long standing in the area. In Quin we have the townland of Applefort, likely drawing its name from apple production.The local industry grew with the fame of one particular variety of apple known as the cackagee, from the Irish ‘cac a’ ghéidh’ meaning ‘goose poo’! The apple originated with Palatine settlers from southern Germany, a few thousand of whom had arrived in Limerick in 1709 on the invitation of Queen Ann. Escaping persecution by the French Catholic army, they constituted the last plantation of Protestants in Ireland. They settled on lands provided by Sir Thomas Southwell around Rathkeale. Living in tight German-speaking communities, they were progressive and industrious farmers. Apple cultivation was included as one of their many skills. Using their own seed stock, in time they became the pioneer apple growers in Munster. They also had a practice of keeping geese in their orchards, which ate the windfalls on the ground. Through their natural and effective recycling processes the geese fertilised the growing apple trees – hence the cac a’ ghéidh/cackagee apple. The apple had a reputation for producing very fine cider, making it the apple of choice for many other apple growers.

Arthur Young wrote of a visit to ‘Drummoland’ in 1776:

This country is famous for cider-orchards, the cakagee especially, which is incomparably fine. An acre of trees yields from four to ten hogsheads per annum, average six, and what is very uncommon even in the cider counties of England, they yield a crop every year. I never beheld trees so laden with apples as in Sir Lucius O’Brien’s orchard; it amazed me that they did not break under the immense load, which bowed down the branches.

Henry Dutton enjoyed Clare cider in 1808 but attributed its flavour to a combination of apples and not just the cackagee variety.

‘There were formerly extensive orchards in this county, especially near Six-mile-bridge, and a few still remain; many young apple-trees have been lately planted. Very fine cider is made here from a great variety of kinds, mixed in the pressing, and not, as is generally imagined, from caccagea or any particular sort; apples are frequently purchased in the county of Limerick* and elsewhere, and manufactured into cider: it is in such deserved repute, that it is generally bought up by the neighbouring gentlemen for their own use and as presents to their friends, the price usually about five guineas per hogshead’.

(*Palatine apples?)

Reverend James Hall in his ‘Tour through Ireland’ in 1813 wrote that Cackagee cider around Tralee sold at ‘3 or 4 Guineas a hogshead, when common cider does not fetch more than one Guinea’.

The cider industry was in noticeable decline by the early 1840’s, due in no small part to the Famine. Clare still had six listed ‘Cider Makers’ in 1841 – the highest of any county. In 1845 at the outbreak of the Famine, the Parliamentary Gazetteer of Ireland reported that in Clare ‘Cyder orchards, for the production of the beverage called ‘Cackagee’, were formerly of considerable note, but seem to have fallen into disrepute’. It seems that, to date in any case, the once famous cackagee apple variety is no more. This loss of the venerable fruit makes the work of the Seed Savers in Mountshannon, shared keepers of the Native Irish Apple Collection, all the more important for the future of Irish apple species. A award-winning “Cockagee” cider (in name if not in cultivar) is produced in county Meath using the traditional keeved (natural fermentation) method, by the Cider Mill Company, Slane.

 

 

There was a young lady from Hyde

Who ate a green apple and died.

While her lover lamented

The apple fermented

And made cider inside her inside.

 

 

MH February 2026

What did the Anglo Normans ever do for us?

We are well aware of the impact of the Anglo-Norman invasion on our history, the undermining of Gaelic society and the replacement of our native structures. Poor old Diarmuid MacMurrough takes a lot of blame for all of this, despite the fact that Henry II in England had already sought and had been given approval by Pope Adrian to invade and civilise us. Henry was just waiting to finish his war in France before sorting us out!

Anyway, in they came, conquered, settled, married and eventually becoming more Irish than even ourselves, ‘níos gaelaí ná na Gaeil féin’! But besides building towns and castles, robbing our women (and probably taking our jobs!), what did the Anglo-Normans do for us – if anything?

Well, for one, they gave us a whole new suite of names, both forename and surname, to choose from.

The Norman influence on Irish surnames

Following the invasion of 1169, a large number of Anglo-French first and last names entered into Ireland. Many, such as Power, Browne, Fleming, Joyce, Burke, Barry, Costello, Nagle, Nugent, D’arcy, Roche and Walsh/Welsh/Wallace, are nowadays considered Irish and are commonly found in Clare. So, too, are those with the Fitz prefix such as Fitzmaurice, Fitzgerald, Fitzgibbon and Fitzpatrick which most people would regard as Irish as the shamrock. Fitz, meaning ‘son of’, can be considered the Norman version of Mac (it derives from the Latin/French ‘fils de’, meaning ‘son of’). Burke came from de Burgh, Roche from de Roiste, Power from de Paor.

In 1366, a law was passed that “Every Englishman do use the English language, and be named by an English name, leaving off entirely the manner of naming used by the Irish.” This was introduced to dissuade the settlers from adopting Celtic prefixes or forms of surname. It didn’t have much affect as many settler families added Mac or ‘O’ and Norman names evolved into an Irish form (eg McHenry, McArthur).

In 1465 a law was passed enacting “that every Irishman that dwells betwixt or amongst Englishmen in the County of Dublin, Myeth, Vriell, and Kildare … shall take to him an English Surname of one town, as Sutton, Chester, Trym, Skryne, Corke, Kinsale; or colour, as white, blacke, browne; or arte or science, as smith or carpenter; or office, as cooke, butler ….”

Many of the trades of the early medieval period such as Archer, Butler, Cooper, Carpenter, Draper, Skinner, Tanner found their way into our surnames. Other introductions from this period came from the mercenary soldiers who accompanied the Norman invasion: Walsh (meaning Welsh), Joyce and Fleming (from Flemish mercenaries) are examples.

Incidentally, the Normans usually took their surnames from the place of their family origins. So, D’arcy originates in Arcy in Normandy. De Clare originates in Clare in Suffolk where the Anglo-Norman family were based. While De indicated their place of origin, Le was used to describe them, eg Le Poer meant ‘a poor person’.

De Burgh – Burke – from a placename in Suffolk, France

Le Botilier – Butler – Occupation bottle steward

De Barra – Barry – from an estate in Wales

Le Waleys – Walsh – the Welshmen

De Angulo – Costello/Nangle – from Nangle Pembrokeshire

What of their influence on forenames?

 Many of the Normans forenames introduced here were of a biblical or European saintly origin.

 In 1922, Reverend Patrick Woulfe wrote extensively on the topic of Irish name origins as follows:

In the same manner Norman and English names became current in Irish families during the thirteenth and subsequent centuries. These have now almost completely supplanted the old Gaelic names. The names borne by the Normans and by them introduced into Ireland, were of three kinds :

 (1) names of Scandinavian origin which their ancestors had carried with them to Normandy ;

(2) names of Germanic origin which the Frankish conquerors had brought across the Rhine and which had ousted the old Celtic and Latin names from France ; and

(3) Biblical names and Latin and Greek names of saints,, which the Normans began to adopt about the beginning of the eleventh century.

Together with these came in a few Celtic names from Brittany, a small number of Anglo-Saxon names, some Danish and Norse names from England, and one or two British or Welsh names. These were nearly all very rare and most of them soon died out. Of the Anglo-Saxon names, only two, Edmund and Edward, survived. Alfred has been revived in recent times. At the period of the Invasion, Frankish names were by far the most popular among the Normans, but Biblical and saintly names were coming rapidly into favour.

The following is a list, in order of frequency, of the more common names borne by the early Anglo- Norman invaders, the Biblical and saintly names of Latin and Greek origin being printed in italics :

William, Robert, Richard, John, Walter, Roger, Ralph, Adam, Hugh, Henry, Thomas, Nicholas, Gilbert, Geoffrey, Elias, Peter (Piers), Osbert, Reginald, Jordan, Simon, Alan, Stephen, Philip, David, Arnold, Alexander, Laurence, Baldwin, Herbert, Martin, Maurice, Godfrey, Andrew, Alfred, James, Samson, Turstein, Warin, Ailward, Daniel, Edward, Gregory, Bernard, Benedict, Hamon, Matthias, Michael, Gerard, Gervase, Lambert, Wilkin, Patrick, Edmund, Edwin, Hubert, Ivor, Joseph, Oliver, Mark.

 The following in alphabetical order were rare :

 Abraham, Adelard, Ailmer, Antony, Augustine, Brian, Clement, Constantine, Estmund, Eustace, Everard, Gocelin, Isaac, Leonard, Luke, Matthew, Miles, Milo, Odo, Osbern, Osmund, Pagan, Ponce, Randulf, Redmund, Rodulf, Silvester, Turold, Ulf, Vincent.

 The following names only came in, or at least became popular, at a later period :

Bartholomew, Christopher, Francis, Gerald, George, Paul, Roland, Theobald.

 Women’s names among the Normans were nearly all of the Biblical or saintly class:

 Agnes, Alice, Amelina, Anastasia, Annabella, Catherine, Cecily, Christina, Dorothy, Egidia, Eleanor, Evelyn, Frances, Honora, Isabella, Johanna, Matilda, Margaret, Susanna.

 The name Mary does not seem to have come into use in Ireland before the end of the16th century. Brigid only began to be used about the same period.

 

Extracted from ‘Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall’, Patrick Woulfe 1922

Out with the old, in with the new

The Anglo-Normans also brought with them new animal species such as the rabbit and fallow deer, new foods such as wheat, orchard fruits, mutton and farming practices such as hay-making. They introduced us to continental European religious saints and practices of the Roman Church. European religious orders soon followed such as the Franciscans, Augustinians, Cistercians, Dominicans etc. These replaced the structures of the native Irish Christian Church.

Up to then, the Irish natives did not adopt the name of saints as they considered this to be placing themselves on a par with the saint. Such naming convention was reserved for those of higher status in the monasteries. This was circumvented by use of the prefix Maol or Giolla meaning follower or servant. The Normans changed all of that and it was now acceptable to be called Peter, James, Michael, John, Mary, Brigid or Margaret.

Very few of us to this day do not have either a forename or surname that is not of Norman origin. Eventually, arising from the Gaelic Revival in the late 19th century, new Irish language versions of these forenames appeared such as Séan, Seamus, Peadar, Máire, Bríd, Mícheál, Cathal and many more appeared.

The Irish Church did not condemn the practice of slave-trading by the Irish until the invasion by the Anglo-Normans and the encroachment of the Roman Church. The story of Patrick (Patricius, son of a Roman administrator), which was introduced here after the Norman conquest, presents the native Irish as uncivilised pagan slavers who needed to be brought to heel. So the Normans inadvertently gave us our native saint and a forename for a good chunk of our population for generations following.

Out with the new, in with the old

Children are rarely given these European saint names today. Authentic Gaelic forenames are much more popular. We are nevertheless, unlikely to see the demise of the Anglo-Normans surnames that were introduced here. But all of us Mikes, Jimmies, Johnnys, Paddys, Kittys, Cathys, Maggies and Bridies can thank the Normans for what they brought us!