Irish Family History - A Lost Cause?
The Irish Diaspora Genealogy has become hugely popular throughout the world in recent decades but has long had an important position in Ireland. Many of the surviving medieval Gaelic manuscripts are accounts of the pedigree of important, powerful Irish families. This was, to some extent, a display by such families of the legitimacy of their position and power but was also a display of the respect for ancestor's which has always been a feature of Irish society. Where did this ancestral respect come from? Well it could be said to have come from the land and the Irish love of the land. Under the ancient Brehon Law ownership of property was not vested in individuals or even necessarily families but in kinship. What you could own depended on who you were descended from. So, yes, it was vitally important you knew who your ancestors were. Despite centuries of British rule and being banned under that rule from owning land this sense of kinship has persisted strongly amongst the Irish. Eve...