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Finding monumental sculptors in Ireland.

The people who put up headstones have many names.

Stonemason, stonecutter, lettercarver, sculptor, and monumental sculptor are a few that come to mind.

Sometimes, about 1% of the time, we find the stonecutters name carved on the bottom of the headstone. It'll say something like Fecit D McCarthy.

Which is latin for D McCarthy made this!

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Using the 1911 & 1901 census for tracing Irish ancestors

It's the most important digital resource for Irish family history and genealogy!

http://census.nationalarchives.ie/

As one of the main women behind it, Dr Caitríona Crowe, said though, it's a digital copy of the census, not _the_ census.

Here's how to use it!


Step 0 - search your address/townland name in www.townlands.ie and find your place- write down some of these; town, townland name, street & electoral division.

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Surname searches using Historic Graves Family Search Page.

When we started doing the Historic Graves Project I thought we'd get about 100-200 Irish surnames.

How wrong could one archaeologist be?

Growing up in Cork city I thought I knew most Irish surnames - O'Connell, O'Callaghan, Lyons, Sutton, Hurley, Connery, O'Mahoney, Varian, O'Keeffe, were the surnames that surrounded us - my own surname didn't quite fit in though cos I think we were the only Tierney's in a school of 1000 students. Our teachers were Daly, Olden, Lynch, Hannon.

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Lost in Ireland - trying to avoid it.

I've been lost in every county in Ireland. 

I like it. Being lost.

Unless there's somebody waiting at the other end. Don't like that feeling as much.

As a city 'boy' rural Ireland was a strange country to me. Except for a small pocket of S Limerick, the rest of Ireland may as well have been Ontario or Florida until my early 20s. I liked geography at school and I knew the names of rivers and mountains but I couldn't tell you was Duhallow a town, village or what? 

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Brambles and Fireballs in Carlow - A Visit to Pollerton Little.

On the old Carlow town to Baltinglass road is a small, overgrown graveyard. It bears the name Knockaunarelic - the small hill of the graveyard - and it is located in the townland of Pollerton Little. I thought Pollerton was going to be a local landlord's name but it is in fact related to the limestone solid geology beneath - sinkholes giving the name 'townland of the holey ground - Baile Pholaird Beag'.

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