There has been no book on Dublin's street-names since M'Cready's 1892 Dublin Street Names (reprinted in 1987 by Carrick Books). This most interesting work containing more than 1,500 street-names, gives every known version of each name from the earliest sources, and every change of name that occurred throughout the centuries. However, where we are occasionally informed that a name derived from the Irish, the original Irish form is not provided. Ballybough, we are informed, means "the town of the poor", but we are not provided with An Baile Bocht.
In the case of Donore, Cabra, Finglas, etc., we are not informed that all these derive from Irish. A bibliography is supplied, with a list of parliamentary books and newspapers, as well as a list of maps from 1610 onwards.
Fresh from the press in Belfast Street Names, published by Translink in association with Belfast Civic Trust, and edited by George Carson. Compared to M'Cready's work this book contains a modest 196 street names.
A very high number are named after politicians, and a number have literary connections - Byron Place, Glenvarlock Street (a character from Sir Walter Scott), Copperfield Street (from Charles Dickens), Edmond Street (a character from a Thackeray novel) and so on.
Nor can Belfast be called a onehorse town! A number of streets are named after horses, three after Derby winners - Ardpatrick Gardens, Cicero Gardens and Donovan Parade.
There is rare acknowledgment where Irish is the origin of the street names, and where there is, not all are correct or accurate. The Irish supplied for Stranmills is Strahanmilis, instead of Sruthan Milis (sweet stream). Ballymacarret, apart from having a "double-t" at its end, is incorrectly given to mean "the townland of the son of Art (O'Neill)". The correct Irish is Baily Mhic Gearoid, `the town of Mac Gearoid'.
Gearalt and Gearoid are listed as separate first names in Irish Personal Names (O Corrain and Maguire), and the surnames derived from them are also separate and different. The first is Mac Gerailt (Fitzgerald), and the second Mac Gearoid. De Bhulbh's Sloinnte na hEireann/Irish Surnames gives the anglicised form of the latter as Mac Garrett, a name no longer extant. He quotes Woulfe's Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall as saying that it was once in Co Cork, where today the name Garrett is still to be found. Some dropped the "Mac" leaving Garrett, and some now so-named may, in fact, be Mac Gearoid. As in the case of many other similar-sounding surnames, Mac Garrett, Fitzgerald (Mac Gearailt), and the English surname Garrett, were interchanged. We will concern ourselves with Mac Garrett.
In 1532 evidence was brought to prove that "Tybbot Butler of the Nigham" was illegitimate, and was not entitled to "all such inheritances as concerneth the heir male of the Earldom of Ormond". Considering that people did not then live as long as they do now, it is amazing how the defence in 1532 succeeded in procuring Edmund FitzTybbot, aged about 66 years, Nicholas Walshe, aged about 69 years, Donalde mac Craghe, aged about 70 years, Nicholas Croke, aged about 74 years, Cormoke mac Dermyd Y Owlwe, aged 100 years, and John Boy Lundey, aged 100 years and more, to swear that Tybbot's mother, Elyne, was never married to Tybbot's father.
The last listed said that the night Edmund and Elyne departed out of Carrikmacgryffyn they spent the night in the house of Reymonde Mac Gerode of the Haggarde.
This is a townland in the Co Waterford parish of Kilmakevoge. A 1541 list of the jurors for the barony of Ardmayle (Co Tipperary) contained the name William McGerod, Pepperstown.
The Co Limerick book of the Civil Survey 1654-1658 (Vol. IV) lists Thomas McGarret of Trienmeanagh (now Treanmanagh) in the Co Limerick parish of Grean. A few years later when the Census was carried out, John McGarrett, gent, was Titulado of North Killashura in the same barony of Kenry.
Edmund McGarrett was one of those transplanted to Connaught at that same time, receiving 23 acres in Tuam, Co Galway.
The 500 Garretts listed in the telephone directories, are equally distributed throughout the island.