Claddagh Gifts at Totally Irish Gifts         …

Cornelius [Con] Colbert was another young man who is also less known for his role in Ireland's 1916 Easter Rising.  He was born in 1888 , one of thirteen children, into a small farming community to…

Éamonn Ceannt is a little-known leader of the 1916 Easter Rising. Born in Ballymoe in County Galway, he was one of nine children. His father was an RIC Officer…

Irish is considered to be the first uttered literary language of Europe. The ancient Gaeilge of Ireland served as the seed language for Scottish Gaelic and Manx, just as the venerable Irish gene pool originally spread north and east to Scotland, to the west of England, and beyond.…

Administration of the estates of the landed gentry in Ireland during the Victorian era was meticulous.  Large estates employed agents, accountants, solicitors, valuators and cartographers, all of whom created detailed records.  These collections, if they survive, can be a treasure…

“Although we all have tongues, we are surprisingly bad at knowing precisely what they're doing or conveying that to others,” says UC Santa Cruz professor of linguistics Jaye Padgett.

Tongue motion, it turns out, is crucial to the documentation of endangered…

If you've studied Gaeilge for any amount of time in the United States than you probably have experienced the problem of expanding beyond the basic vocabulary. However, if you live in Ireland you might have a different experience. For those who want to learn advanced vocab there is a studying method which is always helpful to those…

"The Loneliest Boy In The World"

Gearóid Cheaist Ó Catháin with Patricia Ahern (Collins Press, 2014)

Review by Felicity Hayes-McCoy.

At the westernmost end of Ireland’s Dingle peninsula,…

Like any other language, the goal is to constantly aim for a higher level of written and spoken understanding. The path to this enlightenment can be achieved by taking the next step of predicting what native speaks would say in person, on the radio, or on television.To begin,…

Ladies and Gents,

Good day to you all. Late joiner to the party here but none-the-less hopefully bringing an important message to you all. 

Fort Patrick Kelly is named for the famed leader of the Irish Brigade,…

On the afternoon of Wednesday, 6 August, 2014, our own Ryan O'Rourke had the opportunity to visit the site of the old White O'Morn Cottage in Tiernakill, Maumm, County Galway.  This old site, which now lies in ruins, is better known to the world as "The Quiet Man Cottage."  The…

The Annual Connemara Pony Festival takes place in Clifden, County Galway from Sunday the 27th through Sunday the 24th of August. The highlight of the festival is the Connemara Pony Show on Thursday and Friday. To mark this important annual event, I'd like to offer this brief primer…

Creevykeel Court Tomb is made up of a long, trapeze shaped cairn which encloses an oval court, and a burial chamber that is…

This is part four in a series of articles on "Searching for Your Irish Ancestors" written by Ireland-based professional genealogist Nicola Morris of Timeline Genealogy. You can find…

In our genealogy classes, we often investigate the origin of the surname.  In one case, this led to an interesting historical fact about the phrase “The Real McCoy.”

McCoy: “A common surname of Scottish origin in…

In the 1560s, Queen Elizabeth I began to see the value in becoming familiar with the Irish language.  The Queen was already well versed in the French, Italian, Latin and Greek languages.  There can be little doubt that her interest in the Irish language was brought on by her desire…

The mention of Irish land and property records causes many people to switch off and say that their people never owned property in Ireland. Indeed, it is true to say that very few people in 18th and 19th century Ireland owned their own property!

However, a wonderful…

Ireland in the 1650s lay in ruins. Twelve years of calamitous warfare had destroyed the country's infrastructure and resulted in the death of over 20% of the Irish population.

In August 1649 the New Model Army, led by Oliver Cromwell, went to Ireland to re-occupy the country following the Irish Rebellion of…

(First published 2012) Last year's BBC documentary on Ireland's "Limbo Babies" brought to light an emotionally charged issue that affected almost all of our Irish ancestors.  Ever since the Roman Catholic Church declared that the non-baptized were forbidden burial in…