Know Your Townlands – Feaghquin

Feaghquin is known to us all as the location of our playground, Hassetts pub & stables and the exit from the village to SMB.

This name translates as Fíoch Chuinche (Fee-ock Cuin-ke) from middle-Irish ‘fíodhach’ meaning ‘abounding in woods’.* The ‘ach’ element denoting “abounding in” or “full of” in middle Irish is now found as ‘agh’ in modern Irish.**

While no longer abounding in woods, it certainly has been abounding in underground features such as eel-holes, caves, and potholes, providing suitable protection for the local bats.

It lies south-east of the village and is adjacent to Kildrum to the south and Dangan to the north. It has an area of 76.09 hectares / 0.7609 km²; 0.29 square miles.

 

In 1641 the townlands entire 200 plantation acres were in the ownership of Daniel McNamara. In 1659 & 1661 the major owner was Murrough O’Brien. By 1670 this had been forfeited and was in the ownership of John McNamara and Brian McGrath (a transplanted papist), who presumably had sworn allegiance to the post Cromwellian regime. The townland at that stage was almost entirely unadulterated by man-made features except where it touched onto the village itself. It was therefore sparsely populated until road access developed.

By 1855, Griffiths Valuation recorded it as home to Rev Daniel Corbett, Pat Halloran, Pat & Catherine Burke and John D Fitzgerald. Margeret Ryan from Feaghquin, who emigrated to the States is mentioned elsewhere as one of its residents. Unusually, it has never been home to any manor or demesne. By this time the road to SMB had penetrated its territory (late 1700’s), the village school had been built (1896) and the Newline Road from the village to Cutteen cut through its north eastern edge (famine era).

In 1881 the townland had a population of 23 and had increased to 28 by 1891.

By 1901 the census records a population of 33, with the major families as the Ryans, Moylans, Fahys, Bourkes, Crowes and Frawleys. This did not change much in the following 10 years except for the addition of Meaneys and Cullinanes.

Indeed, much of the same names were probably still to be found until the 1990’s when development began to spill out along the Six Mile Bridge and New Market on Fergus roads. It will likely remain a predominantly rural and agricultural area of Quin into the near future.

Hassetts Pub is probably the best known feature of this townland

See https://ebw.pms.mybluehost.me/malachy-hassett-quin/

Poulnagordon Cave, in Feaghquin, was locally known as “The Bridges of Quin” and is found to the north of the SMB road.  It is home to a colony of Lesser Horseshoe bats. The entrance is now blocked and access difficult.

 

Feaghquin, Quin – a possible Commemorative Stone Cairn

In the Schools Manuscripts Collection from the Clare area, Agnes Clune collected information from Martin Moylan of Feaghquin in1938, which detailed a leacht and a local custom in the village of Quin that pointed to something very close to the coffin stone tradition. The ‘leacht’ seems to have been a combination of coffin-rest and a commemorative cairn. These cairns were formed by placement of stones to mark the death of someone.

‘There is a place in Feighquin called “leacht na marbh”. There is a round heap of stones raised to a point there. It is said that there is a chieftain buried there.
The reason it is called “leacht na marbh” is long ago the main road passed by the side of this leacht of stones. When a funeral was passing by, they used to rest the coffin on the top of the leacht, and everyone at the funeral would leave a stone on the “leacht.”  (Schools Manuscripts Collection, 1938).

A similar story is told by Martin Fahey in this folklore collection. The aerial photo above shows a ground feature alongside the SMB road in Feaghquin orientated toward Feaghquin Hill. Might this be the remnants of this road on which the ‘Leacht na marbh’ was built?

Quin School The first recorded ‘National school’ in Quin is in the year 1856. The school known locally as a “Reading House” was situated where Malachy Hassett has his stables in Feaghquin. The home of the late Mrs. Muriel O’Neill was at that time the residence of the teacher. The last teacher to live there was Mrs. Lena Weldon – Helena Degidon of Rylane and her husband John Weldon, aka the writer Brinsley MacNamara. The first recorded enrolment in the “Male School” in the year 1863 was Michael Clune – Carhugar – farmer, aged 15. In 1871 there is a record of the first infant – aged 6 – William Considine, whose father is registered as a teacher. Situated in Feighquin, the ‘Old School’ was built in 1896. The boys and girls schools were amalgamated on April 1st 1928. Up to that year they were separate schools.The last significant upgrade was in 1960 at Newline. It was occupied in 1964. The old school was used by the local Macra na Feirme as a garage and training workshop for skills such as welding and mechanics for many years afterwards.

Brinsley MacNamara, was the pen-name of John Weldon a writer, playwright and registrar of the National Gallery of Ireland. He was the author of several novels, the best known was his first, The Valley of the Squinting Windows (1918). The book caused a furore in his native Westmeath on its publication to the extent that Brinsley had to retreat from his home place of Delvin. He continued to write for many years after his controversial first work. Among his plays are The Glorious Uncertainty (1923) and Look at the Heffernans! (1926). On the 23rd of June 1920 MacNamara married a local Quin girl, Helena Degidon of Rylan in Clooney Church. Helena was a school teacher. The couple lived in Feaghquin next door to the school.

Historical references

From Logainm.ie

1633     Fyegh Qynhie      Inqiquin Papers (Cl) Leathanach: 2.303

1. 1655 Fiaquinhy  DS

C.1660    Fyaquinhy         BSD (Cl) Leathanach: 147

1677     Feaguiny           ASE Leathanach: 236.53

1686   Feaquinny           CG Leathanach: 43

1726   Feighe Quin          CGn. Leathanach: 51.210.33439

1734   ffia Quin     CGn. Leathanach: 75.310.53195

1839    Feeaghquin   BS:AL

1839    Fiadh Chuínche    OD:AL & pl:AL

1839   Feaghquinny      QRL:AL

*Justin Ó Gliasáin, An Brainse Logainmneacha / The Placenames Branch

**PW Joyce – Origins of Irish PlacenamesAch, lack, nack, rack, tach, track, soacli.  All these postfixes have a collective signification when placed

after nouns and  generally  convey  the  sense  of  full of, ” abounding  in,”  much  the  same  as  the  English

postfixes fid,?/,  and  om.  In Irish writings, especially if they be ancient, these terminations are often written

ech^  lech,  &c. ;  and  sometimes,  in  compliance  with  a grammatical  custom,  they  are  changed  to  each,  leach,

&c. ;  but  these  changes  do  not  influence  the  anglicised forms.

Ach,  This  is  the  most  common  of  all  Irish  terminations, and  its  most  usual  form  in  anglicised  names

is  agh,  which  is  sounded  with  a  strong  guttural  by the  people,  but  pronounced ‘ah’  by  those  who  cannot

 

1890. Notice to tenants and occupiers from the High Court of Justice, Chancery – Land Judges, in the matter of the sale of Feaghquin, barony of Bunratty, part of the estate of Mary Anne Molony and others, owners, and the Provincial Bank of Ireland, Ltd., petitioners. With attached schedule and map. 4 Nov. 1890. 3 items.

TCD Downs Survey website

Griffiths Valuation,  Census of Ireland 1911 (Munster), 1901 & 1911 Census websites

1930’s Schools Folklore Collection