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Abundance of good quality food prior to the famines in Clare

Hely Dutton, in his Statistical Survey of the County of Clare of 1808, describes the range, quality and availability of food (and drink) in the county in a way that is surprising. These observations of course were made before a series of famines devastated the county. He makes no mention of the potato, on which we are told the poorer populace later depended:

“Hospitality, for which this county, as I am informed, was always remarkable, still hails the coming guest, but on a more rational and improved principle than formerly, as deep and excessive drinking is exploded from all genteel tables; on the other hand they have not learned from their neighbours to put the cork in the bottle, when they think their guests have had enough.

The materials for exercising this social virtue are to be found no where in greater abundance or perfection, or on cheaper terms. The western ocean, that flows within fourteen miles of Ennis, the county town, supplies every sort of sea-fish, that is known or desired either as a necessary or a luxury in Great Britain; every kind of shell-fish is also to be had in great plenty and perfection, including the Pouldoody oysters, that for flavour are universally allowed to be superior to any in the world. Salmon, pike, trout, and eels are obtained in great perfection and profusion from the Shannon and several other rivers in this county, and from the numerous lakes, that present themselves in different directions.

Beef, mutton, pork, and poultry are also very cheap, and, except the last, very good. The vegetable market of Ennis is one of the best I haven seen in a country town.

The wild fowl of this county, particularly in the barony of Inchiquin, are remarkable for being well fed, and for a high and at the same time a sweet flavour.

Formerly this county contained a number of deer-parks, and the venison was esteemed exquisitely fine, as the heathy grass, the hazel copse, and all that wild herbage, that deer love to feed on (and without which they are not as good as mutton,) abounded in many parts; but there are few inclosures kept up for deer now, as the rise on lands has so greatly encreased their value, that what few years ago was allotted for a deer-park, as rough mountainous ground worth little or nothing, if set at this day, fetches a very great rent; consequently venison has become proportionably scarce, few wishing to pay at least half a crown a pound for it, the rate at which I am convinced every person, that feeds on five years old buck, eats it.”

This report was compiled at the mid-point between 2 major famines in 1740 and then again in the 1840’s. Food was cheap, of good quality and widely available. Elsewhere Dutton comments on how tall many of the men were in and around Quin (a possible indicator of good nourishment). It is a far cry from the reports available to us in John Singletons diary of the ravished nature of the people of Quin forty years later. See https://ebw.pms.mybluehost.me/john-singletons-diary/

Although in 1817, Bernard Trotter, while conducting a walking tour of Ireland and passing between Quin and Spancelhill commented:

‘the village near the Abbey is wretched, the cabins very poor . . . There is a great poverty in Clare and the miserable attempt to sell unlicensed spirits in their mud-cottages scarcely excited displeasure’.

In 1813, John Curwen, the Manx M.P., compiled a report on the state of agriculture in Clare. He commented on how farming had developed over the previous 30 years. He particularly noted the huge increase in rents and farming incomes, brought about mainly through the demand created by the Napoleonic wars. Curwen was one of the few visitors to note the prosperity then being enjoyed by the people, a situation, which unfortunately proved to be short lived.

In 1842 the humble potato at last gets a mention by a German travel writer. Johann Georg Kohl came to Ireland in September of that year ‘without’, as he said himself, ‘any object in view other than to become acquainted with the country, and to see everything that was interesting and remarkable in it’. His comment on the diet of the peasantry while travelling through Clare reflects a change in their circumstances:

“Many Irishmen have but one day on which they eat flesh, namely, – on Christmas day. Every other day they feed on potatoes and nothing but potatoes. Now this is inhuman; for the appetite and stomach of man claim variety in food, and nowhere else do we find human beings gnawing, from year’s end to year’s end, at the same root, berry, or weed. There are animals who do so, but human beings, nowhere except in Ireland.”

Reaching much further back, we can read a short account from Hugh Brigdall, Ennis attorney. He is the son of Hugh, the Burgess of Ennis, and lived in Roslevan but the family was to be found in Ennis from 1613. He gives this account of the county’s agricultural output in an unpublished travel diary:

“The more particular products of this county are coleseed in the marshes, a commodity first brought hither by Dutchmen; fir trees in an island of the Shannon; yew and juniper in the barony of Burren and an abundance of swans in the loughs of Insiquin; in brief it is a county better for pasture than for tillage wherein is no want of fish, fowl or venison, red or fallow deer”.

Hugh Brigdall, 1682 Description of the County of Clare. The Other Clare Vol.22, p56

We must remember that the recorded observations of the above visitors were gathered by and on behalf of an audience that was not local. They usually represented the landed rather than the landless class. While abundance of provision may have existed for some, a parallel meagre existence is likely to have been experienced by many others. What these observations do seem to tell us is that the county was well capable of providing for its people, but the political system wasn’t.

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!