What does the surname map actually show: where a name lives now or where it was rooted in 1890?
Where it was rooted in 1890. The map is built from the 1890 birth registers, the last full picture before a century of emigration, city growth and internal movement moved the names around. That is a feature for roots research, not a flaw: it shows the counties your family most likely left from. A name can be strong on our map in a county where few of the name live now, and common in Dublin today while barely registering in 1890. Read the map as the name's homeland a century and more ago, not as a phone book.
Useful pages: The Irish surnames map · Trace your Irish roots · The 1926 Census guide · Coming home · Irish around the world · Plan your journey
Sources
- R. E. Matheson, Special Report on Surnames in Ireland; Patrick Woulfe, Irish Names and Surnames (1923)
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