County Wexford

Townlands

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TOWNLAND

The townland is the smallest and most ancient of Irish land divisions. The townland was named at an early period, and they usually referred to a very identifiable landmark in the local area such as a mountain, a bog, an oak forest, a village, a fort or a church. The townland became standardized as a basic division in the 17th century surveys by people with little knowledge of the Irish language. As a consequence many place names were either lost or had their meaning or construction altered.

A record of townland names, shapes and sizes for all Ireland exist in the maps of the Ordnance Survey completed in 1846 at the scale of 6 inches to 1 mile. Furthermore the "General Alphabetical Index to the Townlands and Towns, Parishes and Baronies of Ireland" by Alexander Thom, Dublin, 1861 (reprinted by The Genealogical Publishing Company, Baltimore, 1981) will identify all of Ireland's 60,462 townlands against their Ordnance Survey sheet number, county, barony, parish and poor law union.

All major records will provide the townland address of an ancestor. The civil parish, the major administrative division, is in effect a group of townland