The Annual UPNS Autumn Lecture 2021
Commemorating Colum Cille: A Panel Discussion on Columba and His Legacy in the Place-Names of Ireland and Scotland
Thursday 16th December 7-8:30 (online)
2021 marks the 1,500th anniversary of the birth of Colum Cille (St. Columba) and The Ulster Place-Name Society are delighted to be welcoming the following experts to participate in a panel discussion on the Saint’s legacy in the name-scape of these islands.
Professor Thomas Clancy is Professor of Celtic and Gaelic at the University of Glasgow and has directed a series of research projects involving place-names and the evidence they can provide for language, society and religion in medieval Scotland. His most recent project Iona’s Namescape: Place-Names and their dynamics in Iona and its environs. has particular significance for the panel theme with Iona being the location of Colum Cille’s most famous monastery, which became a hub for early Christianity in both Ireland and Britain.
Dr Alasdair Whyte holds a Lord Kelvin/Adam Smith Research Fellowship in Celtic Onomastics at The University of Glasgow. Dr Whyte’s research to date has focussed primarily on the place-names of Mull and Glasgow and he is also a Co-Investigator on Iona’s Namescape: Place-Names and their dynamics in Iona and its environs.
Dr Kay Muhr was Senior Research Fellow of The Northern Ireland Place-Name Project at Queen's from its foundation in 1987 until 2010. She has been president of the Society for Name Studies in Britain and Ireland, and chairman of UPNS.
Professor Mícheál Ó Mainnín is Professor of Irish & Celtic Studies in Queen's University Belfast. His primary research interests are in Irish and Scottish Gaelic language and literature, particularly in language and identity, name studies, and the literature of the medieval and early modern periods. He is also the Director of The Northern Ireland Place-Name Project.
We are also delighted to be celebrating the launch of The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names of Ireland by Dr Kay Muhr (above) and a Dr Liam Ó hAisibéil who is a Lecturer in Irish and Celtic Studies in the School of Languages, Literatures and Cultures at the National University of Ireland, Galway.
The Ulster Place-Name Society's Annual Autumn Lecture is held in memory of Irish-language scholar and founder of the Ulster Place-Name Society, Seán Mac Airt (1918-1959). Seán Mac Airt was born in Keady, Co. Armagh. He received his early education at the De la Salle College in Keady and then won a scholarship to St Patrick's College, Armagh. He graduated from QUB with a BA in 1939 and was awarded an MA by QUB for his research on ‘The verbal system of bardic poetry’. In 1942 he joined the staff of the School of Celtic Studies at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies and remained there until 1948 when he returned to Queen's, where he was head of the department of Celtic for ten years. As well as establishing of the Ulster Place-Name Society in 1952, Mac Airt edited the society's Bulletin, as well as contributing regularly to scholarly and Irish-language journals. Seán Mac Airt died from illness in Belfast in June 1959.
The event is free to attend, registration is essential via the following link TICKETS. If you have any problems with registration please contact f.kane@qub.ac.uk