Sometime in the late 1950s Dublin Corporation resolved that henceforth the name plaques on all new roads and streets would bear an Irish name only. A number of residents in a new housing estate in Clontarf objected to this, and at their own expense erected name plates bearing an English version, side-by-side with the Irish ones.
The explanation for this action was that postmen, fire-brigades, etc., would not be able to locate places otherwise. But this attitude to the Irish language was but in the halfpenny place compared to what was to be visited by property developers on the landscape - particularly Dublin - since then. New building developments currently on the market bear the names Riverwood, Harbour Bay, Hazel Meadow, Beach Court and Elliott's Mews. (Sorry that last one is in England - but how can one tell?) Amidst the lot we were chuffed to find a new estate unashamedly named Cnoc Aoibhinn.
Was Cnoc Aoibhinn, we wondered, an original Co Dublin placename, possibly anglicised Knockeevan? There is one in Ireland and that is in Co Tipperary. Maybe Mountpleasant? There are eight townlands so named in Cos Mayo, Roscommon, Galway, Limerick, Wexford, Wicklow, Offaly, Carlow, but none in Co Dublin. But fad saol agus aoibhneas to those who will come to live there.
Co Carlow's Mountpleasant is in the parish of Fennagh, and is listed in the 1814 Directory as the residence of James Garret, Esquire. Taylor & Skinners 1778 Maps of the Roads of Ireland shows Garret Esq at Kilgarron, east of Leighlinbridge, also in the parish of Fennagh, having the alias Janeville.
Were Kilgarron, Mountpleasant and Janeville the same place? Two Garretts of Janeville subscribed to Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of Ire- land (1837). Owners of Land of One Acre and Upwards (1876) listed the Rev William Garrett (no address) with 340 Carlow acres, and in the same county Rev James P Garrett, Kellistown, with 874 acres. Then there were 54 Mayo acres the property of Rev George Garrett, Dublin; a single Garrett acre in Belfast; 93 acres of Samuel, of Summerseat, Clonee, Co Meath, and the six acres of Joseph, Merrion, Dublin.
Of the surname Garrett, MacLysaght's The Surnames of Ireland says this is mainly of English origin in Ireland, but has also been used as a synonym of Fitzgerald (Mac Gearailt). Gerrard, we learn, is also used as a synonym. De Bhulbh's Sloinnte na hEireann/Surnames of Ire- land, published in 1996, says that Gearoid is the Irish for both Garrett and Gerrard. Telephone directories list 100 Garretts north of the Border, and almost 340 to its south, scattered throughout the provinces.
In the Lusk area of Co Dublin in 1474, John Gerrot was listed as a debtor; three years later Patrick Gerrot, smith, is listed as owing 2s; the following year Richard Gerrot of Dublin city is mentioned, and in 1478 we read of William Gerrot: "In the name of God, Amen. In these writings we excommunicate William Gerrote, of Leixlip, on account of his contumacy incurred before us, at the instance of Janico Dartas, and we have decreed execution." Was this execution of the decree or William Gerrote? If the latter one could imagine contumacy rapidly going out of fashion.
The Irish Fiants of the Tudor Sovereigns (15211603) lists persons so-named from 1570 up to 1602 in Cos Kilkenny, Kildare, Dublin, Cork, Waterford, Limerick (Ballylanders), and possibly Tipperary. As was the custom wives retained their own names, and herein are listed? ny Garret, and in Co Cork in 1602 Margaret nyne Gerrot, indicating that these bore an Irish surname in the Irish form (ni and inion ui). Mac Garrett was among the principal Irish surnames in the Co Limerick barony of Kenry in the 1659 Census.
Garrettstown names townlands in Cos Cork and Meath, and in the Co Carlow parish of Rahill.