Blasket Islands
Encyclopedia
The Blasket Islands are a group of island
Island
An island or isle is any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, cays or keys. An island in a river or lake may be called an eyot , or holm...

s off the west coast
Coast
A coastline or seashore is the area where land meets the sea or ocean. A precise line that can be called a coastline cannot be determined due to the dynamic nature of tides. The term "coastal zone" can be used instead, which is a spatial zone where interaction of the sea and land processes occurs...

 of Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

, forming part of County Kerry
County Kerry
Kerry means the "people of Ciar" which was the name of the pre-Gaelic tribe who lived in part of the present county. The legendary founder of the tribe was Ciar, son of Fergus mac Róich. In Old Irish "Ciar" meant black or dark brown, and the word continues in use in modern Irish as an adjective...

. They were inhabited until 1953 by a completely Irish
Irish language
Irish , also known as Irish Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family, originating in Ireland and historically spoken by the Irish people. Irish is now spoken as a first language by a minority of Irish people, as well as being a second language of a larger proportion of...

-speaking population. The inhabitants were evacuated to the mainland on 17 November 1953. Many of the descendants currently live in Springfield, Massachusetts
Springfield, Massachusetts
Springfield is the most populous city in Western New England, and the seat of Hampden County, Massachusetts, United States. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers; the western Westfield River, the eastern Chicopee River, and the eastern...

 and some former residents still live on the Dingle Peninsula
Dingle Peninsula
The Dingle Peninsula is the northernmost of the major peninsulae in County Kerry. Its ends beyond the town of Dingle at Dunmore Head, the westernmost point of Ireland.-Name:...

, within sight of their former home.

The islanders were the subject of much anthropological and linguistic study around the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries particularly from writers and linguists such as Robin Flower
Robin Flower
Robin Ernest William Flower was an English poet and scholar, a Celticist, Anglo-Saxonist and translator from the Irish language. He is commonly known in Ireland as "Bláithín" . He married Ida Mary Streeter.-Life:...

, George Derwent Thomson
George Derwent Thomson
George Derwent Thomson was an English classical scholar, Marxist philosopher, and scholar of the Irish language.-Classical scholar:...

 and Kenneth H. Jackson
Kenneth H. Jackson
Kenneth Hurlstone Jackson was an English linguist and a translator who specialised in the Celtic languages. He demonstrated how the text of the Ulster Cycle of tales, written circa AD 1100, preserves an oral tradition originating some six centuries earlier and reflects Celtic Irish society of the...

. Thanks to their encouragement and that of others, a number of books were written by islanders that record much of the islands' traditions and way of life. These include An tOileánach (The Islandman) by Tomás Ó Criomhthain
Tomás Ó Criomhthain
Tomás Ó Criomhthain was a native of the Irish-speaking Great Blasket Island off the coast of County Kerry in Ireland. He wrote two books, Allagar na h-Inise written over the period 1918–23 and published in 1928, and , completed in 1923 and published in 1929...

, Peig by Peig Sayers
Peig Sayers
Peig Sayers was an Irish author and seanachaí born in Dunquin , County Kerry, Ireland. Seán Ó Súilleabháin, the former archivist for the Irish Folklore Commission, described her as "one of the greatest woman storytellers of recent times".-Biography:She spent much of her early life as a domestic...

 and Fiche Blian ag Fás (Twenty Years A-Growing) by Muiris Ó Súilleabháin
Muiris Ó Súilleabháin
Muiris Ó Súilleabháin became famous for his memoir of growing up on the Great Blasket Island off the western coast of Ireland, Fiche Bliain ag Fás , published in Irish and English in 1933...

.

The Blasket Islands have been called Next Parish America, a term popular in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and recalled in the book The Blasket Islands - Next Parish America by Joan and Ray Stagles.

The six principal islands of the Blaskets are:
  • Great Blasket Island
    Great Blasket Island
    Great Blasket is the principal island of the Blaskets, County Kerry, Ireland.-Geography:The island lies approximately 2 km from the mainland at Dunmore Head, and extends 6 km to the southwest, rising to 292 metres at its highest point...

     (An Blascaod Mór)
  • Beginish
    Beginish
    Beginish is one of the Blasket Islands of County Kerry, Ireland. It is a low-lying island in Blasket Sound, between Great Blasket Island and the mainland. It has a large colony of Arctic Terns...

     (Beiginis)
  • Inishnabro
    Inishnabro
    Inishnabro is one of the Blasket Islands of County Kerry, Ireland. It is separated from Inishvickillane by a narrow sound , and rises to 175 metres....

     (Inis na Bró)
  • Inishvickillane
    Inishvickillane
    Inishvickillane, also spelled Inishvickillaun or Inishvickillaune, is one of the Blasket Islands, County Kerry, Ireland. Referred to by Blasket islanders as "The Inis", Inishvickillane was intermittently inhabited during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, by one or more families...

     (Inis Mhic Uileáin)
  • Inishtooskert
    Inishtooskert
    Inishtooskert is the northernmost of the Blasket Islands, County Kerry, Ireland. The name means "northern island". The island is also known as An Fear Marbh or the sleeping giant due to its appearance when seen from the east...

     (Inis Tuaisceart)
  • Tearaght Island
    Tearaght Island
    Tearaght Island or Inishtearaght is an uninhabited steep rocky island west of the Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Republic of Ireland. At longitude 10° 39.7' Tearaght is the westernmost of the Blasket Islands, and thus the westernmost island in the Republic of Ireland and the British Isles...

    (An Tiaracht)


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