School: Mantua (roll number 2327)
- Location:
- Mantua, Co. Roscommon
- Teacher: Pádraig Ó Beirn
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0238, Page 052
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD.
See copyright details.
DownloadOpen data
Available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- XML School: Mantua
- XML Page 052
- XML “Local Heroes”
- XML “Local Happenings”
Note: We will soon deprecate our XML Application Programming Interface and a new, comprehensive JSON API will be made available. Keep an eye on our website for further details.
On this page
- (continued from previous page)mow eight Irish acres in the week. It was said that in his youth he was mowing for a man named Carney at Rathard Ioctar and being a weak man and a poor mower then he became exhausted and lay down to rest himself in the fort. The fairies taking pity on him edged his scythe and it was so sharp that it could cut the "wool on the water" (local saying). The fairy told him to keep a portion of this scythe in any of the scythes he would use in later times and that the fairy gift of a good edge would be with him. He did so and there was no one in this district who could edge a scythe like him or mow as much meadow in the day.
The greatest singers of this district were a family by the name of Tighe that lived at crossroads of Skea near Elphin. They were blacksmiths by trade. The songs they sang were Willie Reilly and the Colleen Ban. The pride of Boherve. Songs written about local happenings. The songs were sung in Irish and English. A verse was sung in English and then in Irish.
- The cholera visited the district in 1857 and many people died. In Elphin to this day there is a house known as the Cholera house. It was a disused barrack used by horse police(continues on next page)
- Informant
- Michael Cannon
- Gender
- Male
- Age
- 93
- Occupation
- Farmer
- Address
- Kilmacumsy, Co. Roscommon
