Townlands

A townland (Irish: baile fearainn) is a small geographical division of land used in Ireland. The townland system is of Gaelic origin, pre-dating the Norman invasion, and most have names of Irish Gaelic origin. However, some townland names and boundaries come from Norman manors, plantation divisions, or later creations of the Ordnance Survey. The total number of inhabited townlands was 60,679 in 1911. The total number recognised by the Irish Place Names database as of 2014 was 61,098, including uninhabited townlands, mainly small islands.

In Ireland a townland is generally the smallest administrative division of land, though a few large townlands are further divided into hundreds. The concept of townlands is based on the Gaelic system of land division, and the first official evidence of the existence of this Gaelic land division system can be found in church records from before the 12th century, it was in the 1600s that they began to be mapped and defined by the English administration for the purpose of confiscating land and apportioning it to English investors or planters.

The term "townland" in English is derived from the Old English word tun, denoting an enclosure. The term describes the smallest unit of land division in Ireland, based on various forms of Gaelic land division, many of which had their own names.

The term baile, anglicised as "bally", is the most dominant element used in Irish townland names. Today the term "bally" denotes an urban settlement, but its precise meaning in ancient Ireland is unclear, as towns had no place in Gaelic social organisation. The modern Irish term for a townland is baile fearainn (plural: bailte fearainn). The term fearainn means "land, territory, quarter".

The Normans left no major traces in townland names, but they adapted some of them for their own use, possibly seeing a similarity between the Gaelic baile and the Norman bailey, both of which meant a settlement.

Throughout most of Ulster townlands were known as "ballyboes" (Irish: baile bó, meaning "cow land"), and represented an area of pastoral economic value. In County Cavan similar units were called "polls", and in Counties Fermanagh and Monaghan they were known as "tates" or "taths". These names appear to be of English origin, but had become naturalised long before 1600. In modern townland names the prefix pol- is widely found throughout western Ireland, its accepted meaning being "hole" or "hollow". In County Cavan, which contains over half of all townlands in Ulster with the prefix pol-, some should probably be better translated as "the poll of ...". Modern townlands with the prefix tat- are confined almost exclusively to the diocese of Clogher, which covers Counties Fermanagh and Monaghan, and the barony of Clogher in County Tyrone), and cannot be confused with any other Irish word.

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