From Irish Names and Surnames 1923
de BÚRC, de BÚRCA—XI—de Burgo, De Burgh, Burke, Bourke; i.e., 'of the burgh' or 'borough.' This family ranks with the Fitzgeralds and Butlers as among the most illustrious of the Anglo-Norman settlers in Ireland. They derive their descent from William Fitz Adelm de Burgo who, in 1171, accompanied Henry II to Ireland, was made governor of Wexford, and in 1178 succeeded Strongbow as chief governor of Ireland. In 1179, Fitz Adelm obtained a grant of a great portion of Connacht. By marriage with an heiress of the de Lacys, Walter de Burgo acquired, in addition to his other possessions, the earldom of Ulster; and the Burkes became the greatest Anglo-Norman family in Ireland. On the murder, in 1333, of William, the Brown Earl of Ulster, leaving only an infant daughter, the leading male representatives of the name adopted the Brehon law, which provided for a male succession, and dividing the lordship of Connacht between them, proclaimed themselves Irish chiefs under the style of MacWilliam Uachtar and Mac William Iochtar, that is, the Upper and Lower MacWilliam, the former seated in Co. Galway and the latter in Co. Mayo. And so Irish did the Burkes of Connacht become, that they were at one time regarded as 'mere Irish.' Minor branches assumed the surnames of MacDavid, MacPhilpin, Mac Seoinin, MacGibbon, MacRedmond, etc., from their respective ancestors. The Burkes were also lords of the barony of Clanwilliam in Co. Limerick. The name is now very common all over Ireland.
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Truelove's Journal: A Bookshop Novella
From a sad, comfortless childhood Giles Truelove developed into a reclusive and uncommunicative man whose sole passion was books. For so long they were the only meaning to his existence. But when fate eventually intervened to have the outside world intrude upon his life, he began to discover emotions that he never knew he had.
This is a story for the genuine booklover, penned by an Irish bookseller under the pseudonym of Ralph St. John Featherstonehaugh.
Annals of the Famine in Ireland
Annals of the Famine in Ireland, by Asenath Nicholson, still has the power to shock and sadden even though the events described are ever-receding further into the past. When you read, for example, of the poor widowed mother who was caught trying to salvage a few potatoes from her landlord's field, and what the magistrate discovered in the pot in her cabin, you cannot help but be appalled and distressed.
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
Ireland's Welcome to the Stranger
This book, the prequel to Annals of the Famine in Ireland cannot be recommended highly enough to those interested in Irish social history. The author, Mrs Asenath Nicholson, travelled from her native America to assess the condition of the poor in Ireland during the mid 1840s. Refusing the luxury of hotels and first class travel, she stayed at a variety of lodging-houses, and even in the crude cabins of the very poorest. Not to be missed!
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
Henry Ford Jones' book, first published in 1915 by Princeton University, is a classic in its field. It covers the history of the Scotch-Irish from the first settlement in Ulster to the American Revolutionary period and the foundation of the country.
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
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