Co Clare history resource - Irish Folklore Commission

[JPC]

At the risk of noting something that's probably common knowledge to local historians, I hope no-one will mind if I draw attention to the extraordinary records relating to Co Clare myth, legend, oral history and genealogy collected by the Irish Folklore Commission, now held by University College Dublin.

See: http://www.ucd.ie/irishfolklore/en/scho ... me1937-38/

I'd been researching my family history in south-west Co Clare for a long time and had got to the point where I was looking for some background information about ordinary people: what they believed, what they did – the things not usually recorded or included in the standard history books.

I found articles in The Other Clare about the Commission (vol 15, see http://www.duchasnasionna.eu/other_clare/vol_15.pdf) and about the material it collected in and around Rineanna, one of the districts in Co Clare my family lived in (vol. 4, see http://www.duchasnasionna.eu/other_clare/vol_4.pdf).

I started wondering if any of my relatives had contributed material to the Commission. Imagine if they had. It would mean someone had written down all the local tales and maybe some family history into the bargain.

I contacted the exceptionally helpful and efficient lady who curates the Commission's collections at University College. She located a number of exercise books contributed to the Commission by a distant relative while she was at school. I've made a few amazing discoveries while researching family history research - but this was absolutely extraordinary. It was all there: local myths, legends, details of who did what, oral history that went back to the Penal Times and the Famine. It was like a short history of Co Clare.

If one of your relative or someone from where they lived continued records to the Commission, you may find a crop of new information. The Commission's records are an amazing resource and a great credit to Eire.

JPC, Sydney. Australia.