Fingal

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This article refers to the county of Fingal in the Republic of Ireland. For other uses of the name, see Fingal (disambiguation).

County of Fingal
Contae Fhine Gall

Location

Statistics

D (FL proposed)

448.07 km²

Population (2006)

239,813

Website: www.fingal.ie

Fingal (Fine Gall in Irish, meaning "foreign tribe", i.e. Norsemen) is a county of the Republic of Ireland, formed from part of the historic county of Dublin. The Vikings referred to the area as Dyflinarskiri, the hinterland of Dublin. The original name however derived from the old Gaelic Fionn Gall meaning fair strangers, denoting the Norse, whereas south county Dublin was called Dubh Gall, denoting the occupying Danes. Early Anglo-Norman versions of the name include the similar Fiehengall, Fynnegal, Fyngal, and Finegal, which led to the mis-identification with Fine Gall. Fingalian is an extinct language, a hybrid of Old English and Old Norse, with Gaelic influences, which was spoken by the people of Fingal until the mid-1800s.

1 History
2 County status
3 Bibliography References
4 Towns & villages in Fingal
5 Fingal County Council
6 External links

[edit] History

The first administrative identity going by a variant of the original name was the grant of the Lordship of Fingal, a Prescriptive Barony, confirmed by letters patent from King John to Walter de Lacy and his heirs in perpetuity, in 1208, and based on the latter's father Hugh de Lacy's holding the same on a basis of grand serjeanty for his services as bailiff to the King. The lordship of Fingal was a paramount superiority over several sub-infeudated smaller baronies (such as Castleknock, Santry, Balrothery), and thus eventually accrued vicecomital attributes leading to the granting of the first viscountcy in Ireland in 1478 to a Preston, Lord Gormanston, the Premier Viscount of Ireland, who at the time was the main landowner in the area, and a direct descendant of Walter de Lacy. That viscountcy was called after Gormanston as the latter was the principle seat and Manor of the Prestons at the time, having been acquired upon their relinquishment of occupancy of the Manor of Fyngallestoun. The Viscounts Gormanston continued to retain the Lordship of the latter under reversion.

The heraldic crest for Fingal reads "Flúirse Talaimh is Mara" meaning "Abundance of Land and Water". The motto reflects the strong farming and fishing ties historically associated with the area. It also features a Viking longboat, which represents the arrival of the Norse in Fingal, where they became integrated with the existing Irish.

In 1210, Fingal was included in County Dublin, one of the first twelve counties created by King John during the shiring of Ireland. Over the centuries, Fingal included several other baronies, namely Finglas, Feltrim, Howth, Shankill, Swords. A peerage title as Earl of Fingall was created in 1628, by King Charles I of England, and granted to Lucas Plunkett. The title went extinct upon the death of the 12th and last Earl in 1984, along with a peerage barony of the same name, not to be confused with the titular prescriptive barony of Fingal, long retained by the Viscount Gormanston as an incorporeal hereditament in gross.

[edit] County status

The area of Fingal, which had been recognised in various historical accounts throughout the middle ages (most notably the Annals of the Four Masters), was raised to county status on 1 January 1994, through the Local Government (Dublin) Act, 1993 and more formally in the Local Government Act, 2001, with the division of old County Dublin into three new counties. Due to the Government’s failure to deliver on a promised media campaign that was to coincide with the county’s establishment, few people are aware of the idea of "County Fingal" and so to date it has generally been referred to as "North County Dublin". It covers the coastal area north of City of Dublin along the Irish Sea and south of the River Delvin to the River Liffey, and it is bordered by the counties of Meath, Kildare and South Dublin.

As of April 2005, the Fingal county boundary did appear on all Ordnance Survey Ireland "Discovery Series" 3rd edition national maps though the recently released 4th edition published in December 2006 has removed the county and reverted back to showing County Dublin.^{[citation needed]} The county is considered part of the "Greater Dublin Area". Fingal County Council, the administrative authority, inherited the former Dublin County Council premises on O'Connell Street, as no suitable building was available within the county at the time. However, this gave it the unusual status of having its county council offices significantly outside the county, O'Connell Street being in the Dublin City Council area. In 2001, the council moved its main offices to a new building in Swords.

Fingal is Ireland’s primary horticultural region, producing 50% of the national vegetable output and 75% of all glasshouse crops grown in the country. However, the areas of production are coming under severe pressure from other development and the rural towns are increasingly becoming dormitories for the City. Howth harbour is the biggest fishing harbour on the east coast and the fifth largest in the country.

Fingal itself is the fifth largest local government area in Ireland by population. The main urban center in Fingal is Blanchardstown with other important centres at Balbriggan, Castleknock, Howth, Malahide, Mulhuddart, and Swords. The Institute of Technology, Blanchardstown and Dublin International Airport are located within the county.

In 2006 Fingal County Council was lauded[1] by prominent Irish construction industry figures, politicians and EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs [2] for becoming the first local authority in Ireland to introduce mandatory sustainable building requirements. The policy, which relates to all construction in 8 parts of the county--including roughly 13,000 new homes--stipulates that the amount of energy and CO2 emissions associated with the heating and hot water of all buildings must be reduced by at least 60% compared to Irish Building Regulations, with at least 30% of the energy used for heating and hot water coming from renewable sources such as solar, geothermal or biomass.

[edit] Bibliography References

Fingal and its Churches - A Historical Sketch, by Robert Walsh, M. A., Dublin and London, 1888.
Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, edited by Thomas Duffus Hardy, published in 1837. (Available in the Tower of London and in the Guildhall Library, London; it contains original text of the Grant of Fingal by King John in 1208).
The Calendar of the Gormanston Register, Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, edited by James Mills and M.J. McEnery, University Press, Dublin, 1916. The Gormanston Register is a collection of ancient manuscripts going back to the 12th century, belonging to the Viscounts Gormanston, and now lodged in the National Library of Ireland, in Dublin.
History of Killeen Castle, by Mary Rose Carty, published by Carty/Lynch, Dunsany, County Meath, Ireland, April 1991 (ISBN 0-9517382-0-8). This includes a history of the Earls of Fingall - page 18 refers to Lucas Plunkett, the 1st Earl of Fingall, whose first wife was Elizabeth O'Donnell of Tyrconnell, 1st Countess of Fingall.
History of the County of Dublin, by Francis Elrington Ball, Dublin, 1902.
History of the County of Dublin, by John D'Alton, Esq., M.R.I.A. Hodges and Smith, Dublin, 1838.
Dublin City and County: From Prehistory to Present, edited by F.H.A. Allen and Kevin Whelan, Geography Publications, Dublin, 1992 [ISBN 0-906602-19-X].