Talk:Townland

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Anyone gonna manage to put together a List of Townlands then?

There are upwards of 60,000 in Ireland, so it's no easy matter! bigpad 08:48, 21 June 2006 (UTC)


Thats a gigantic task! I wonder if there is a digitised list available, there are certainly books available that list them. GyatsoLa 22:20, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Well there's lists here for the townlands of the Six Counties. It's a massive task alright. Also worth pointing out that a lot of townland are spelt wrongly in that link and government records, etc and local spellings are often different. Derry Boi 18:49, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Digital Townlands

I have obtained a full digital set of townlands together with their names and boundaries from the Ordnance Survey of Ireland.Siomon 10:06, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A few comments

A few comments -

  • Again, as in the high king article, Scotland barely merits a mention despite having its own tradition (and its own article merged into a mainly Irish one.
  • I have added a link to township (Scotland).
  • "baile fearainn" is a highly formal term, and as I understand it, "baile"/"balley" is the usual term used in the Gaelic languages.
  • This section here - "10 acres - 1 Gneeve; 2 Gneeves - 1 Sessiagh; 3 Sessiaghs - 1 Tate or Ballyboe; 2 Ballyboes - 1 Ploughland, Seisreagh or Carrow; 4 Ploughlands - 1 Ballybetagh, or Townland; 30 Ballybetaghs - Triocha Céad or Barony.", should really include a gloss into unanglicised Irish.

--MacRusgail 17:40, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

One reason for the emphasis on Ireland is probably that townlands are legally defined here and have their boundaries, names, etc. recorded, whereas in Scotland, as you yourself say, their boundaries and names have been largely lost. Other than this Wikipedia article and mirrors of it, there seem to be relatively few resources on the Internet dealing with townlands in Scotland.
I've made it clearer that baile fearainn is an official term and that baile is a more common equivalent.
The section on land divisions is taken directly from Larcom so I wouldn't be inclined to insert Irish equivalents into it - Irish equivalents would be gníomh (gneeve), seiseach (sessiagh), táite (tate), baile bó (ballyboe), baile biataigh (ballybetagh), seisreach (seisreagh), ceathrú (carrow). I'm not sure what the correct form for "ploughland" would be, or even if there is a single equivalent form for "ploughland". There are also a variety of other local terms which occur in placenames - gallon, pottle, etc.
--User:Paddy Matthews 01:30, 5 April 2007 (UTC)