A trifling matter? Names in Irish on carts: the Dublin Castle files

Abstract

At the beginning of the twentieth century, as the Irish language revival movement gathered pace, Conradh na Gaeilge encouraged those who were keen to promote the language to use the Irish version of their names as much as possible, including painting their name and address in Irish on carts, and a number of prosecutions were taken under the Summary Jurisdiction (Ireland) Act 1851. Most famously, Patrick Pearse represented Niall Mac Giolla Bhrighde in 1905 in a case stated to the court of King’s Bench. Pearse went on to represent Domhnall Ua Buachalla in a similar but less well-known case the following year. Drawing on files from the Chief Secretary’s Office in Dublin Castle and digitised contemporaneous newspaper reports, this article provides an overview of the names in Irish on carts cases, which began in 1893, peaked in 1905 and died off after 1906, and finds that, post-partition, there were at least three similar prosecutions in Northern Ireland.