Posted on 04/16/2004 6:37:21 PM PDT by Mo1
I don't think you'll get any argument from anyone here.
So9
I was told by my family that the O was put unto their name because they were of Catholic faith in Ireland. They lost their land because they would not take an oath to deny their faith. Thus, they lost their land and became debtors.
Understanding Your Irish Surname
by Pat Friend
Irish surnames as they exist today have evolved over the course of the centuries with influence applied by both politics and the church. A surname today may be an outgrowth of the Gaelic clan system, courtesy of the Norman invasion, or a mix of several factors.
In ancient Ireland, as in the rest of Europe, individuals were known only by one name. Surnames began to come into use around the tenth century when populations grew and became more mobile. The Gaelic Clan provided a logical patronymic convention for the Irish. "O" or "Ua" or "Ui" meaning "grandson of" meant early surnames such as O'Cleirigh (O'Cleary), meaning "grandson of the clerk". Brian Boru, the High-King of the Irish, didn't use a surname. His grandson, however, became known as Teigue Ua Briain and eventually this became O'Brien.
The next step in the convention was the use of "Mac", which means "son of", and is abbreviated "Mc". As in the example of O'Cleary, above, many of the surnames evolved from the occupation of the father or grandfather. A smith for example, was a gabhann, so his son and eventually his family became Mac Gabhainn, or McGowan. Descendants of carpenter's son known as Mhac an t'Saoir would eventually become McAteer, or MacAtee.
The church had a contribution to make in the development of surnames as well. "Giolla" meant "follower" and led to someone Gilmartin (or Kilmartin), which was originally Mac Giolla Mhartain, "son of a follower of St. Martin." Mul as a prefix evolved from "maol" (meaning "bald"), leading to Mulrennan from O'Maoilbhreanainn, "grandson of a follower of St. Brendan". (St. Brendan was a monk and therefore would have been "bald" because of his tonsure.)
The Norman invasion brought with it a set of new surnames (Power, Roche, and Walsh among others) as well as a variation on the patronymic. "Fitz", in modern times considered distinctively Irish, grew out of the French "fils", meaning "son". So, Fitz and Mac mean basically the same thing, as do Fitzgerald and Mac Gearailt.
The arrival of Cromwell and the Plantation of Ulster brought Scottish names, which remain common in Ulster today. The ongoing English presence, however, had a more lasting effect on the native Gaelic and Norman names. During the time when the Penal Laws were if force it became unpopular, if not dangerous, to have a Gaelic (i.e. Catholic) name. "O", "Mac" and "Mc" were dropped. Names were translated into the English. The McGowan mentioned above, for example, might have become the English "Smith".
Finally, the late 19th century gave birth to a Gaelic Revival and the spread of a spirit of nationalism brought a return of some of the earlier conventions. "O", "Mac" and "Mc" were back in many cases. Grady, became "O'Grady" again.
http://allaboutirish.com/library/gen/undersurname.shtm
This was the custom or pattern of most European families
While today's parents may feel free to chose children's names without regard for an unwritten rule, the Irish traditions of selecting children's names may actually prove a good tool for anyone trying to research Irish family history. Children within a family were traditionally named according to the following pattern:
First son after father's father
Second son after mother's father
Third son after father
Fourth son after father's oldest brother
Fifth son after mother's oldest brother
First daughter after mother's mother (or father's mother)
Second daughter after father's mother (or mother's mother)
Third daughter after mother
Fourth daughter after mother's oldest sister
Fifth daughter after father's oldest sister
It's important to consider names in all their forms when looking at family use of the traditional naming patterns. A few examples are:
The Irish Penal Code
by Paul Stenhouse, M.S.C., Ph.D
Most of us know there had been a period often known as the Dark Days of the Penal Code in Ireland. Years back, we may recall the occasional nun or brother mentioning one or other feature of those days, but the full details were not easily found, nor the exact duration of the Dark Days.
May we try here to fill in some of this missing detail?
No attempt will be made to examine tediously the exact dates of each item, but rather it might be said that most of the enactments were in force for most of the time.
The period itself covers, in its worst features, the years of Elizabeth I, James I and Cromwell, that is, roughly 1560 to 1660, though the laws were in force for a further hundred and fifty years.
Their chief provisions were:
— A Catholic was forbidden to vote or to hold public office.
— He could not enter any profession.
— He was forbidden to engage in trade or commerce.
— He was forbidden to live within a walled town or within five miles of a walled town.
— If a child turned Protestant, he automatically inherited his father's property and at once.
— If a wife turned Protestant, she became the sole heir to her husband's property.
— No Catholic could inherit the land of a Protestant.
— No Catholic could purchase any land.
— No Catholic could own a horse valued at more than £5. If he owned a horse of greater value, he was compelled by law to inform on himself to the nearest Protestant.
— No Catholic could hold land valued at more than thirty shillings a year.
— If a Catholic sent his child abroad to be educated, all his property was thereby forfeited and he himself outlawed.
— By law, all Irish people were obliged, under penalty of fine or imprisonment, to attend Protestant worship.
— If anyone refused to disclose a priest's hiding place, he was to be publicly whipped and have both ears cut off.
— it was a capital offence to be a priest. Any priest captured was liable to be hanged, drawn and quartered.
— A price of £5 was placed on the head of a priest, and £20 for a bishop, as an encouragement to informers.
There were roughly 185,000 Irish-American immigrants who fought on both sides of the American Civil War. Of that number all but about 40,000 were in the Union forces. (The large total does also not include descendants of earlier immigrants who may have still held some affinity to their Irish heritage.) The bulk of the immigrants served in largely Irish units, though the organizational placement of those Irish units in the Union and Confederate armies was considerably different.
Why separate Irish units? It helps to understand how the armies were formed but it is also impossible to ignore that there was a certain amount of distrust and discrimination against the Irish in the United States at the time the war broke out.
The Confederates, of course, had to start from scratch. Since they considered themselves a union of almost sovereign states, they turned to those states to raise military forces. As for the Union, Lincoln had only a small standing army at his disposal when it became obvious that the Southern states were going to secede and that war was inevitable. That army was further reduced in size by the resignation of officers and men who felt their primary loyalties lay with the Southern states they called home and accepted positions in the Confederate forces.
In 1861, Lincoln also lacked the authority to raise a federal army or to institute a draft. (The draft didn't come until 1863.) Rather, he had to call upon the States that remained loyal to the Union to raise units that would in turn support the cause of preserving the Union by swearing allegiance to one of the Union's armies, such as the Army of the Potomac.
States Raise Their Units
On both sides, states raised forces by recruiting for specific units. Each unit raised carried its state's name and was raised in the neighborhoods of large northern cities, or in the towns and rural communities across all of the States. Brothers, cousins, fathers, and uncles signed on together and went to battle side-by-side. Since the largely Catholic Irish were not completely trusted by their Protestant neighbors, particularly in the North, they generally joined separate units. These units, of company strength, were roughly 80-100 men, including about 65-80 privates. Many communities, of course, felt the price for this as the war progressed if the unit(s) they sent off suffered heavy casualties. (It was not unusual for individual units to experience 50 percent casualties in some Civil War battles.)
The Irish Brigade at Harrison's Landing, Virginia, 1862 Photo from the Library of Congress Civil War Photograph Collection
Oh well they are off to bed whether they like it or not .. BBL
No one imigrated because they were bored with the weather.
Well, maybe the scandinavians.
So9
I'm not Irish, so think I'll just go to bed...
Good night yall...
.....Westy.....
OMG...I am laughing so hard. So true. One of my relatives was put in a barrel and rolled across the river from Louisiana to Texas to avoid a murder charge. Was that the Red River?
Well, that is what my family says....but what do they know?
So9
The tragedy of the disfunction family seem to be from the struggles of life conditions that were never bargin for. And those in society always lay at the doorstep in those days the stigma of Judgement.
Man kind always so quick to shame another into protocal, but the Lord motto is ~ CHARITY NEVER FAILETH!
CHERISHING THE IRISH DIASPORA
ADDRESS TO THE HOUSES OF THE OIREACHTAS
by
PRESIDENT MARY ROBINSON
ON A MATTER OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE
2 FEBRUARY 1995
http://www.emigrant.ie/emigrant/historic/diaspora.htm
So are we...
OMG..I am laughing so hard, I have the hiccups.
My ancestors immigrated to escape the Bolsheviks. The ones that didn't make it out were marched off to Siberia. As far as I know, most of them didn't live to enjoy the lovely weather.
When I think of my great great father he entered the country through Wisconsin and migrated to Michigan as a young man and married my Gr.Grandmother he had one child a girl and when my grandma was about 7 years, her father died of flu at the age of 25. If it was not for him having a child I would not be here.
This was some of the search I did on my bio family. As one read the stories of the 1800's how much stravation for those who immigrated and wondered around trying to lay down roots.
Goodnight Westy
I am a mix-mash of Irish, German and English and who knows what else for good measure!
It makes me wonder like in WWII they would send out coded messages so could it be this re-apearing photo with different stroies or repeated stories is sending messsage globally?
***
LIMA, Peru - A century after American explorer Hiram Bingham hacked through jungle-shrouded mountains to reach the overgrown ruins of Machu Picchu, heavy tourism and nearby sprawl have endangered the "Lost (news - web sites) City of the Incas."
That's the finding of U.N. evaluators, who recommended that the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization place Machu Picchu on its endangered list.
The recommendation by the International Council on Monuments and Sites, was confirmed Monday by Peru's National Institute of Culture.
During an October visit to Peru, UNESCO (news - web sites)'s heritage chief Francesco Bandarin warned that with some 1,000 tourists visiting Machu Picchu each day, the heavy traffic could severely damage the magnificent stone structure.
Bandarin also criticized the absence of city planning in nearby Aguas Calientes, a ramshackle town where trains unload visitors onto buses to ascend the mountain to Machu Picchu.
Machu Picchu, located atop a craggy peak amid jungle in Peru's southern Andes, is about 310 miles southeast of Lima.
___
What you wrote can mean many things so just what are you implying?
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