In this article, we look at Irish Surnames – their origins and evolution. See if you can find the Irish surnames in your family tree in one of the sections below.

An Irish Placename Travels Abroad to the City of Baltimore.

If you were to pull out a map of your area this moment and have a look, how many places would you spot named after Irish villages, towns and counties? As you may have noticed, anywhere that the Irish – and other nationalities settled in numbers – they also brought along the names of their…

The Yew Tree of Ireland

Last weekend, Carina and myself headed off for a day in the beautiful Muckross Park, near Killarney, in County Kerry. It’s spectacular at this time of year – full of early flower and magnificent trees showing off their new foliage. However, one of the most impressive trees in Muckross manages to keep its leaves all…

County Tipperary Surnames and Places

When someone signs up for our weekly Letter from Ireland, we ask them for the Irish surnames in their family and the counties in Ireland their ancestor came from originally. As a result, we now have about 25,000 entries on our list. The following names are ones we received from readers whose ancestors came from…

A Roadtrip Around 16 Counties of Ireland – Part 4

When we look at Irish surnames today, it’s easy to get confused when we see names that appear to have several different spellings, some look very English or Scottish – how could they be Irish you ask – while other names appear to randomly have an “O” or “Mac” in front of them. Before We…