I am curious as to how much the Irish language has been spoken continuously in the counties that are not in the Republic. Can anyone comment on this? I am interested as my family left a village outside of Omagh, County Tyrone in 1764 and I am curious as to whether they were Gaeilge or English speakers.

le meas,
Faber MacMhoalain

Faber,

Do you have the following information:

- The occupation of the head of the household
- Catholic or Protestant
- The name of the village. The townland.

All of this information can be valuable in trying to determine the likelihood of whether or not these ancestors of yours spoke Irish.

Anyway, Omagh is in the barony of Omagh East in Tyrone. According to Whitley Stokes (1799) 'Irish and English spoken by half and half' in Tyrone at that time. According to the census of 1851, 3.9% of the population of the Barony of Omagh East were Irish speakers. This included 25 monoglots.

Of course, this is AFTER they left in 1764. The percentage of the Irish speaking population in the 1760s in Tyrone was almost certainly higher than in 1799, 1851 and so on.

Did they leave any written records after leaving Ireland? All things considered, I'd say there's a good chance they were able to speak Irish.

Indeed, the second strongest Irish speaking Barony in all of the six counties (which later became part of Northern Ireland) was that of 'Upper Strabane' which isn't too far from Omagh. 24.1% of the population in 1851 could speak Irish, including hundreds of monoglots. Needless to say, the Irish speaking population % there would have been much higher in the 1760s. There were still native Irish speakers there at the time of partition in 1921. Not just scattered speakers but actual breac-gaeltachtaí. Native Irish lasted longer in Tyrone than most places in the six counties. Only the Barony of Orior Upper in south Armagh had a higher Irish speaking population % at the time of the 1851 Census.

There were still native speakers living on Rathlin Island off the Antrim coast until at least the 1960s. Some say the 1980s. Also in the Glens around Cushendall and in south Derry too.

Hope this information is of some use to you.

Gach beannacht,

PS.

The user 'Ggn' may have more information as well.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/obituaries/2008/1011/1223560394806.html

http://www.nwipp-newspapers.com/UH/free/290436382585624.php

http://www.daltai.com/discus/messages/12465/10480.html?980335623

Tá baint ag na leathanaigh thuas leis an ábhar.

"as my family left a village outside of Omagh, County Tyrone in 1764"

Where?

What religon were they?

If their were Catholics there is very little chance that they would not have had Irish.

Dear Danny:

I do not know the name of the head of household, but I believe it was Eneas. My ancestor, Eneas (jr.) was a young boy when he came from Tyrone with two of his brothers and they bought Tuscorora Mountain in Pennsylvania which is right by the turnpike. They eventually settled in a place called McGuire's Settlement with about 29 other families from Ulster. They left Ireland with about 1,000 pieces of gold according to the documents. They set up a lumber mill in PA that is next to an old log cabin called "McMullen House". It is owned today by lawyers and doctors who use it as a hunting lodge.

My family were Catholics from the time of St.Columba. My family originated in Argyllshire Scotland, and right near their home place in Scotland is a cave with a stone altar where St. Columba is said to have arrived and spread the gospel and celebrated the first Mass. At some point (we believe around 1600) my family arrived in Cornamuck Townland. They were always Catholics. Of course, it must be remembered that Roman Catholicism came to Ireland after Celtic or Culdee Christianity had been practiced for almost a millenia in Ireland. They remained Catholic until after they had been in America for 200 years.

My family founded the Catholic town of Loretto, Pennsylvania with 29 other Ulster families. In time, some of the Catholic women of my family married into the Brethren people of Pennsylvania, and that is pretty much what I am now. I have a copy of the sale of the rental rights of our land in Cornamuck (The McMullens pretty much owned the rental rights of all 300 acres of Cornamuck. I believe it had been confiscated from them because of their Catholicism). I have been to Cornamuck (means "Hill of the Pig") and it is a beautiful place. The locals have become good friends and always treat us as though we are coming home (and we are in many ways). I have played my bagpipes at a Mass that was said in honor of Eneas.

I have no writings of my early American family so I don't know what language they spoke when they arrived. We however do have our geneology all the way back through Robert the Bruce, King Kenneth MacAlpine, and all the ancient kings of Ireland, so I know my ancestors spoke Gaeilge. I just was wondering about the generation that came from Ireland to the USA. I have attached a link that is wonderful to listen to. It is my friend John McCusker (in his home in Cornamuck) giving an interview to BBC about Cornamuck in the early times. We will visit John and friends once again this summer when we go to Oideas Gael. I hope I haven't bored you all with this tale, but I thought perhaps some of you would be interested to learn of the voyage and journey of one Irish/Scottish American family, and perhaps tp explain part of my motivation to learn the language, poetry, and literature of my people.

Thank you all for making this forum such a pleasure to me and my 80 year old father,

Le meas agus Beannachtai,
Faber MacMhaolain


http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/yourplaceandmine/topics/history/A738470.sht ml

Faber, a chara,

Thank you for this fascinating family story. I envy you your detailed knowledge of your family history and wish I could match it in respect of my own.

Just a quibble, but you offer a translation of Cornamuck as “Hill of the Pigs”. I would have expected that to have come into English as something like Knockmuck. I note that Declan Forde (in your much appreciated link) offers “Field of the Pigs” which I think would have originated in Irish as something like Gort na Mhuic, but my Irish is poor and I would be grateful if a more experienced contributor could correct this for me.

Anyway, many thanks and more power to you in your Irish studies.

Joyce's "Irish Local Names" gives COR as "a round hill"

eadaoin

"Field of the Pigs" would be "Gort na Muc". (Muc is a feminine noun of the second declension, so muic would be the dative singular, not the genitive plural.) According to the Placename Database of Ireland, this is the Irish name of a townland in Offaly (anglicised "Gortnamuck"). "Cornamuck" is listed in that database, but the Irish name is given as "le deimhniú" ("to be determined").

The people that live there told me it was "Hill of the Pig". I learned that from them before I ever studied the Irish. I will be there again in July.

Faber MacMhaolain

How much Irish do they speak? "(Rounded) Hill of the Pig" would be "Corr na Mhuice", which I would expect to hear anglicised slightly differently than "Cornamuck".

Corr na Muice (na doesn't lenite).

I looked up DIL(the dictionary of Old, Middle, and Early Modern Irish) and I can't find any example of "Cor" or "Corr" meaning hill, rounded or peaked.

I wonder does Dennis King bother to visit us Daltaí these days and would he share his scholarship with us. What does "cor" or "corr" mean in placenames?

Corr na Muc would be perfectly accurate Irish similar to Corr na Móna . Na Muc there would be Tuiseal Ginideach Lag-iolra Genitive case weak-plural: weak plurals are those formed by adding an ~a (na muca the pigs) or making the final consonant slender (na báid the boats). All the other plurals are "tréaniolraí" strong plurals and do not change their endings in the TGI. (And what does TGI stand for? And what does it mean? :-)

Examples of tréaniolraí are ~anna, acha, aí, ~te, etc. Someone more conversant with the grammar than I may wish to add to this explanation. I am sure all I have is the gist of it.

So "Cor(r) na Muc" means "The cor(r) [whatever that is ] of the pigs"

Cor may be a turn, as well.

-Anna, -acha, -aí etc are not really strong plural endings.
Not -aí (na fuinneogaí, gpl na bhfuinneog), and the others have a weak form in the genitive plural in the older language and in Ulster:

éanacha > na n-éanach
ríleannaí > na ríleann...

Funny, my de Bhaldraithe lists:

quote:

corr², f. (gs. coirre, npl. ~a). 1. Hollow, pit. 2. Rounded hill, hump.

(Go raibh maith agat as an gceartachán, a Lughaidh. Bíonn ainmfhocail baininscneacha an dara dhíochlaonta am mhearú i gcónaí.)

Oops! Gabhaigí mo leithscéal. Tá sé in Ó Dónaill. Tá an ceart agat a ghiolla na dtruslóg. Go raibh maith agat.

Corr na Muice

In this case Corr would mean Hollow (as quoted in de Bhaldraithe)
as one of the two meanings.

corr², f. (gs. coirre, npl. ~a). 1. Hollow, pit. 2. Rounded hill, hump.

because it would have to be hollow because Muice is also in the name.
Muc is not pig. But short for Muiceanach. (a marshy place)


Cora as in Cora na Móna has a different meaning. i.e.
a point of land

Muc is not pig. But short for Muiceanach. (a marshy place)

Is úr an maíomh san. An bhféadann tú bunús a thabhairt leis?

I know Wikipedia is not the best source-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muckanaghederdauhaulia

I have always heard that this is the meaning of
Muiceaneach idir dhá Sháile.
Pig-Marsh between two seas.

I expect it would have the same meaning in other placenames with "muc" in it. I don't know.

A Bhadhbh,

But the element in that name is not muc, it's muiceanach, which is a different word entirely in the same way that, say, corrach is an entirely different word from corr. Equating the two makes as much sense as saying that wherever you see pota it really stands for poitín!

Looks pretty transparently Corr na Muc 'round hill of the pigs'.

Greetings from the County Tyrone,
I am glad Faberm that you liked the piece on Cornamuck. If you are over in the summer give me a shout and I'll furnish you with a full copy of the broadcast. I'm calling with John McCusker next week and will pass on your regards. I'll give John my contact details.
Declan Forde

Declan:

Please give John my regards and let him know that I am bringing mo mathair agus m'athair for another visit to Cornamuck. We should be with him on Friday July 24th. Tell him that I'll write before then so we can go behind his house to take photos of our old McMullen Homeplace.

I thoroughly enjoyed your piece that is on the internet. I came across it while doing a search for "Cornamuck" on the internet. Feel free to email me directly at to give phone details, etc. It would be great to meet you when we're over in July. We'll be at the Oideas Gael school from July 25th through the following week.

Slainte agus beannactai agat,
Faber