***This is part 5 of 9 in a series of maps which looks at the decline of the Irish language from 1771-1871.***
In my last post, I mentioned that the story of language shift had now transitioned from “natural” to “unnatural” attrition. The effects of this shift is now apparent in this map. Virtually all baronies are now reporting declines, some are reporting extreme and profound declines of 15-20% per decade. It is clear that the language is in profound crisis by this point.
Although the number of children being raised with Irish is rapidly contracting, actual numbers of Irish speakers are still rising due to decline in mortality and the very high birth rates in the west and south of Ireland. In fact, some have postulated that the explosion of births in Mayo (which will see an extra 100,000 people in the county by 1841) may in fact have caused the proportion of Irish speakers in the rest of the population to marginally rise. A minority of children are being raised with the language nationally, but in Mayo, a curious feature is occurring; in some places, the proportion of Irish speakers relative to the rest of the population is actually rising. The hunt for land to cultivate in this booming rural population is leading more and more families to migrate down from the hills and into the bogs in an attempt to secure tenancies, even if the land itself would have been considered completely unsuitable a few decades before. This is causing Irish to recover in areas where there had been some decline.
Great change is afoot in Munster. This is the age of Ó Connell’s land campaign, and the great Kerryman has been travelling the country expounding his desire for the political and economic improvement of the Irish people. In Munster most especially, Ó Connell has been particularly active, and this is having a disastrous effect on the language. Although a native Irish speaker himself, Ó Connell is typical of his age in that he regards the language as a barrier to progress;
*“Although the Irish language is connected with the many recollections that twine around the hearts of Irishmen, yet the superior utility of the English tongue, as the medium of all modern communication, is so great that I can witness without a sigh the gradual decline of the Irish language.”*
Ó Connell actively encouraged the population to abandon Irish, and he clearly had an effect. Any place that hosted an Ó Connellite rally in the 1820s and 1830s, witnesses a sharp decline in the number of children being raised with the language. In Munster this is especially the case where political and social feeling had raised Ó Connell to the status of a major celebrity. His words mattered. Thus, decline compounds upon decline and Munster is reporting sharp and dramatic contractions. Particular declines are notable between Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir, Mullinahone, Fethard, Cahir and Cashel. Significant decline is also starting to take hold in South West Cork, particularly around Bantry and Bandon, and moreso in mid Cork where Fermoy and Mallow are now switching decidedly to English.
In Ulster, the Oriel Gaeltacht is in rapid retreat. Ironically, the number of people who are literate in Irish is increasing substantially. A religious revival amongst Protestants in Ireland and Britain has led to attempts to convert the Irish to Protestantism by teaching people to read the Bible in Irish through a number of Irish Bible Societies. These societies have employed a number of the Gaelic poets who have seen their craft garnering less and less support from the anglicising peasantry and are now being paid a small salary as schoolmasters for the Bible Societies with the principle aim of converting native Irish speakers to Protestantism. The poets have also been employed in translating polemical texts against Catholicism by the Societies, psalm books, hymnals and short Primers in Irish are also being distributed to the population. Although literacy is generally a positive development in language preservation, in this case it provokes an extreme reaction. Rates of Irish transmission fall off a cliff as people develop a hatred of the language and of anything written in it. John Ó Donovan, writing from Kingscourt, County Cavan, remarked in 1836;
*“the teachers of the Bible through the medium of the Irish language, have created in the minds of the peasantry, a hatred for everything written in that language and that the society who encourage them could not have adopted a more successful plan to induce the population to learn English and hate their own language”*
George Petrie, the antiquarian, found in travelling Oriel that people had taken such a hatred for anything written in Irish that they were using Irish manuscripts as grocery wrapping paper and to light fires. He managed to buy a horde of manuscripts, including an incomplete 16th century poetry manuscript, from a butcher near Cootehill who had been using them as toilet paper.
In Donegal, a dramatic contraction is taking place in the barony of Tirhugh. The towns of Ballyshannon, Bundoran and Donegal have already switched to English, but now the rural areas are rapidly following suit. The decline of Irish in this barony is the most dramatic anywhere in Ireland, and Tirhugh is destined to be the first barony on the west coast where English dominates. In Tyrone, Irish continues to retreat from the lowlands, but in the Sperrins, it is proving extremely resilient. Its heartland in Glenelly shows no sign whatsoever of decline.
Great maps and really interesting.
Did people in the West, where Irish was still very much the spoken language, differ in terms of their identity to those in places in Leinster?
Interesting that the language is still relatively strong in Roscommon, Sligo and Leitrim in this decade – it has been suggested that most of the Famine-era emigrants from those counties were Irish-speakers?
Why do you have Longford and Leitrim bording Lough Derg on the Shannon. On the north and north-west of the lake you have Longford and Leitrim. They also appear farther north where you might expect them but what’s the deal with the two on Lough Derg?
Níor mhaith liom an deireadh a fheiceáil sa scéal seo… 🫣
5 comments
***This is part 5 of 9 in a series of maps which looks at the decline of the Irish language from 1771-1871.***
In my last post, I mentioned that the story of language shift had now transitioned from “natural” to “unnatural” attrition. The effects of this shift is now apparent in this map. Virtually all baronies are now reporting declines, some are reporting extreme and profound declines of 15-20% per decade. It is clear that the language is in profound crisis by this point.
Although the number of children being raised with Irish is rapidly contracting, actual numbers of Irish speakers are still rising due to decline in mortality and the very high birth rates in the west and south of Ireland. In fact, some have postulated that the explosion of births in Mayo (which will see an extra 100,000 people in the county by 1841) may in fact have caused the proportion of Irish speakers in the rest of the population to marginally rise. A minority of children are being raised with the language nationally, but in Mayo, a curious feature is occurring; in some places, the proportion of Irish speakers relative to the rest of the population is actually rising. The hunt for land to cultivate in this booming rural population is leading more and more families to migrate down from the hills and into the bogs in an attempt to secure tenancies, even if the land itself would have been considered completely unsuitable a few decades before. This is causing Irish to recover in areas where there had been some decline.
Great change is afoot in Munster. This is the age of Ó Connell’s land campaign, and the great Kerryman has been travelling the country expounding his desire for the political and economic improvement of the Irish people. In Munster most especially, Ó Connell has been particularly active, and this is having a disastrous effect on the language. Although a native Irish speaker himself, Ó Connell is typical of his age in that he regards the language as a barrier to progress;
*“Although the Irish language is connected with the many recollections that twine around the hearts of Irishmen, yet the superior utility of the English tongue, as the medium of all modern communication, is so great that I can witness without a sigh the gradual decline of the Irish language.”*
Ó Connell actively encouraged the population to abandon Irish, and he clearly had an effect. Any place that hosted an Ó Connellite rally in the 1820s and 1830s, witnesses a sharp decline in the number of children being raised with the language. In Munster this is especially the case where political and social feeling had raised Ó Connell to the status of a major celebrity. His words mattered. Thus, decline compounds upon decline and Munster is reporting sharp and dramatic contractions. Particular declines are notable between Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir, Mullinahone, Fethard, Cahir and Cashel. Significant decline is also starting to take hold in South West Cork, particularly around Bantry and Bandon, and moreso in mid Cork where Fermoy and Mallow are now switching decidedly to English.
In Ulster, the Oriel Gaeltacht is in rapid retreat. Ironically, the number of people who are literate in Irish is increasing substantially. A religious revival amongst Protestants in Ireland and Britain has led to attempts to convert the Irish to Protestantism by teaching people to read the Bible in Irish through a number of Irish Bible Societies. These societies have employed a number of the Gaelic poets who have seen their craft garnering less and less support from the anglicising peasantry and are now being paid a small salary as schoolmasters for the Bible Societies with the principle aim of converting native Irish speakers to Protestantism. The poets have also been employed in translating polemical texts against Catholicism by the Societies, psalm books, hymnals and short Primers in Irish are also being distributed to the population. Although literacy is generally a positive development in language preservation, in this case it provokes an extreme reaction. Rates of Irish transmission fall off a cliff as people develop a hatred of the language and of anything written in it. John Ó Donovan, writing from Kingscourt, County Cavan, remarked in 1836;
*“the teachers of the Bible through the medium of the Irish language, have created in the minds of the peasantry, a hatred for everything written in that language and that the society who encourage them could not have adopted a more successful plan to induce the population to learn English and hate their own language”*
George Petrie, the antiquarian, found in travelling Oriel that people had taken such a hatred for anything written in Irish that they were using Irish manuscripts as grocery wrapping paper and to light fires. He managed to buy a horde of manuscripts, including an incomplete 16th century poetry manuscript, from a butcher near Cootehill who had been using them as toilet paper.
In Donegal, a dramatic contraction is taking place in the barony of Tirhugh. The towns of Ballyshannon, Bundoran and Donegal have already switched to English, but now the rural areas are rapidly following suit. The decline of Irish in this barony is the most dramatic anywhere in Ireland, and Tirhugh is destined to be the first barony on the west coast where English dominates. In Tyrone, Irish continues to retreat from the lowlands, but in the Sperrins, it is proving extremely resilient. Its heartland in Glenelly shows no sign whatsoever of decline.
Great maps and really interesting.
Did people in the West, where Irish was still very much the spoken language, differ in terms of their identity to those in places in Leinster?
Interesting that the language is still relatively strong in Roscommon, Sligo and Leitrim in this decade – it has been suggested that most of the Famine-era emigrants from those counties were Irish-speakers?
Why do you have Longford and Leitrim bording Lough Derg on the Shannon. On the north and north-west of the lake you have Longford and Leitrim. They also appear farther north where you might expect them but what’s the deal with the two on Lough Derg?
Níor mhaith liom an deireadh a fheiceáil sa scéal seo… 🫣