Have you ever heard of Gill’s Gate Field, Rushey Field, or Churchtown Big Meadow? What about Rape Field, Fernyfield, or Bottoms?
These are some of the names of fields in our locality, and I happen to know these ones because they are marked on maps of the Powerscourt and Charleville estates. But every field had a name, and I hope still has a name, which is what this project is all about. A conversation with some local farmers during the Gathering weekend, along with a comment about “The High Field” at Bushy Park got me thinking about how to collect these field names. They need to be collected soon, before they are lost forever.
There have been other successful field name gathering projects, including one in North Kilkenny, the recently published Field Names of County Meath, and one in progress in County Louth. They have informed the approach being taken here, which is:
- Prepare maps of local areas with fields identified.
- Identify people who have local knowledge to name fields.
- Send out maps and a log form to account for field names, and anything of historical/heritage interest in those fields.
- Compile information gathered online for everyone to see.
Can you help?
Even though this project is focussing on one civil parish (Powerscourt, with a nod to some fields to the east towards Kilmacanogue), it is an enormous undertaking. Knockbawn, I think the smallest townland in the Parish, has 10 fields. I am still cataloguing Barnamire, and am at 32 fields and counting. I estimate that there could be 750 – 1000 fields in the area. Help from interested parties would be appreciated! The main areas are:
- Volunteers to go and gather data – it’s one thing sending out a map for someone to fill in, but another to go over a map with a local expert, over a cup of tea, talking through the maps, what is of interest.
- Data loggers – when (if/when?!) information comes in, it will need to be logged into a database so that is of use to anyone searching the information.
- Sponsors – the project is operating on a shoestring budget (currently zero). The Ordnance Survey maps are expensive, as is printing and associated costs. Donations (no matter how small) gratefully accepted through PayPal. Email enniskerrylocalhistory@gmail.com to arrange.
I hope within one year we will have compiled a significant number of field names of our area. Please do get involved if you can.
Happy to help with Data Loggers part
Thank you! Fingers crossed we get some data…!
lol, I’m thinking in years to come someone will be asking about the parts of Kilgarron Park, “Scully’s Park” (I always wondered why with all the families living in that little enclave it was called “Scully’s) “The White Wall” (the side of your garden) and “Drivers Hill”. down at the “Style”. It’s like on earlier post when I said we always did in our family (and still do ) refer to the Forge Road as the “back road”
Well I only know the Style out of that lot, so we better start writing those down too!
can’t believe you don’t the ‘White Wall’ lol Had your parent’s hearts broken playing football there
Let the record state that it’s colour is now “Morning Sunrise” 🙂
This project sounds great, let me know if I can help in anyway. Eve Campbell (Louth field names project coordinator). evejennifercampbell@yahoo.com
Hi there, thanks for that. Making good progress with field names – hardest part is getting time to visit people who know names. Was a bit ambitious to do it in a year, but slowly collecting them. Thanks for sharing the Louth information on the web, it was great to help with the planning of this (much smaller scale) venture!
Michael