The Placenames Commission is a wonderful organisation. For two decades its expert staff has been working almost unnoticed on a great national project: the collection and definitive identification of all the placenames in Ireland. A walk in the countryside is always made more interesting by asking farmers and older people about their townland names. Just like accents, it never ceases to amaze how varied and rich such names are. The fact that the increasing urbanisation of Irish society is taking place at so fast a pace makes the work of the commission all the more important.
When I last wrote about the progress of the project, only two counties had been completed - Louth and Limerick.
But what was staggering at the time was that all the research work - collected at the offices of the Ordnance Survey in the Phoenix Park - was on paper.
Imagine what would have happened if there was a fire? A national archive would have been wiped out.
Speaking about this to the former Taoiseach, Mr Charles Haughey, who now has other things on his mind, he agreed that the commission would have to be computerised in the interests of preserving for posterity such a significant body of research.
Whether or not Mr Haughey got things moving, I cannot say, but the Placenames Commission is now computerised.
A substantial database already exists but it will take two more years for the archive to be transferred to disc.
While the volumes, as they appear, would adorn any bookshelf, the creation of the computerised database opens up exciting prospects.
The commission's future work may be available to the public on disc and there is no reason why it should not be on the Internet. Would that not be of interest to the Irish diaspora around the world as well as to the people of Irish extraction who would like to know more about their roots?
Would not walking holidays be enlivened if before one set out, the database could be trawled for information about the townland names on the proposed route?
Given that walking has become an important element in the Irish tourism package, there is every possibility that in the years ahead, the commission's work could become an essential and marketable part of that package.
That's a far cry from the old days when a spark, a match or a cigarette end, might have destroyed all those years of effort.
The commission, despite its small staff - only four people are dedicated to the project - has been making solid progress.
To counties Louth and Limerick, may be added Waterford, Offaly, Monaghan and Kilkenny.
In previous years, the commission followed the Ordnance Survey as it mapped the countryside.
Nowadays, it goes its own way. The Limerick volume contains 1,800 placenames; Louth, 700; Waterford, 1,700; Offaly, 1,200; Monaghan, 1,800; and Kilkenny, 1,600. Next year, volumes will be published covering Tipperary, where 3,250 placenames have been recorded; Galway (4,600), and Dublin which has 1,066 placenames.
According to Mr Donal Mac Giolla Easpaig, the higher placenames officer in the commission, public interest in the derivation of placenames has never been greater.
In Dublin, he adds, concrete now covers a high percentage of the townlands but people nevertheless want to know about their past history.
The work of the commission is meticulous and scholarly. No stone is left unturned in the quest to examine and verify the origin of the placenames.
Of course, for years, enthusiastic amateurs have tried to make sense of some of the arcane townland names, but when the work of the commission is completed, there will be at last an official and comprehensive record of the names which often tell us what our ancestors were about and why they so named the various townlands.
Cork, being the largest county in the Republic, poses a special challenge to the commission. It has more than 5,600 placenames, Mr Mac Giolla Easpaig says, and so far, up to 700 have been logged and documented.
The publication of the Cork volume is eagerly awaited but it will be some time yet before the research is finished. Kerry, with its rich diversity of placenames, will also take some time. And when the database is finalised, there will be a record not only of the placenames and their meaning, but matters of local historical importance as well.
The commission is not given to lobbying in public, but having come from a paper-driven organisation to a computerised one, there is an evident requirement for more staff. A national treasure is being collected - it would not cost too much to speed up the work.