Featured themes 02/04/2026

Carrowconeen / Ceathrú Uí Choinín
‘the quarter of Ó Coinín’ (logainm.ie #20889)

Date: 02/04/2026

Easter will be celebrated this year by most Christians on Sunday, April 5th (for most Orthodox churches it will be Sunday, April 12th), which conveniently brings us to the topic of the Easter Bunny and a look at the occurrence of all things coinín ‘rabbit’ in the townland names of Ireland. However, before we discuss examples we must briefly continue with last month’s note concerning its evolutionary cousin, the (mad March) hare. These swift and graceful animals were apparently hunted in the distant past, and in the Old Irish tale Táin Bó Fraích (ed. Meid, lines 53–55) we find a description of hounds in pursuit of seven hares (míl maige), seven deer (ag), seven foxes (sinnach) and seven wild boar (torc alta) (cf. Fergus Kelly, Early Irish Farming, p. 282). In modern literature, a man’s obsession with hunting a hare (An Cailín Rua ‘the reddish(-furred) girl’) forms the plot to Pádraig Ua Maoileoin’s excellent novella Fonn a Níos Fiach. However, despite this literary record of the pursuit of the hare in an ancient Irish hunt, there has been a long-standing reluctance to eat that particular animal in Ireland. Compare the frequency of tales about hares with special powers in Bailiúchán na Scol / Schools’ Folklore Collection in 1937–1938 (see Bailiúchán na Scol: Giorria), indicating that they were connected with the otherworld.

In contrast to the hare, however, there appears never to have been any reluctance to consume its evolutionary cousin, the rabbit, after its introduction into Ireland by the Anglo-Normans. (While living in Germany in the 1990s one of the present writers baulked when presented with a dish of Hase ‘hare’, until it was explained that Hase can also denote ‘rabbit’ in most southern German dialects, rather than Standard German Kaninchen. The German word for the Easter Bunny is Osterhase, literally ‘Easter hare’.) Indeed, the keeping of rabbits for consumption by Anglo-Norman colonists, and its subsequent proliferation in the ecosystem over time means that we find the borrowed word coinín ‘rabbit’ (< Mid. English coning) in a number of townland names. Take for example:

Ballinagoneen / Baile na gCoinín ‘the town(land) of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #55584) in Co. Wicklow;
Clashnagoneen / Clais na gCoinín ‘the trench of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #50266) in Co. Waterford;
Lisnagoneeny / Lios na gCoiníní ‘the ring-fort of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #23917) in Co. Kerry;
Kylenagoneeny / Coill na gCoiníní ‘the wood of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #32443) and Lackanagoneeny / Leaca na gCoiníní ‘the slope of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #32344) in Co. Limerick;
Rathnaconeen / Ráth na gCoinín ‘the ring-fort of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #34189) in Co. Mayo;
Knocknagoney / Cnoc na gCoiníní ‘the hill of the rabbits’ (logainm.ie #66067; see also placenamesni.org Knocknagoney) in Co. Down.

Even more common than direct references to the coinín ‘rabbit’ in Irish placenames are references containing coinicéar (var. coinigéar), another borrowing, this time from Middle English conigēr(e) ‘a rabbit warren’. Relatively clear reflexes of the gaelicized form, such as Coneykeare, have sometimes become established as the English-language versions of townland names, but more common are the many English variants such as Cunaberry, Conaberry, Coneyburrow and Warren. (There are too many instances to outline here. A brief search in logainm.ie using the word coinicéar will provide the reader with numerous examples.) Most English-speakers would probably not recognize the underlying meaning of townland names such as Coneyburrow (logainm.ie #16261), Coney Island (logainm.ie #15133) despite their frequency. This is due to the fact that rabbit had gradually replaced the use of coney in English from the 16th century onwards, so that by the 19th century the latter had almost completely fallen out of use. As a result, we can be quite confident that placenames such as Coneyburrow reflect an earlier stratum of English settlement than those in which we find rabbit, such as Rabbit Island (logainm.ie #20889) in Co. Galway and Rabbitburrow (logainm.ie # 42028) in Co. Offaly. A good example is the townland Ballyteige Burrow (logainm.ie #54069) in Co. Wexford, which is described as a ‘cunniger’, ‘cunniborrough’, ‘conygree’ and ‘conyberrew’ in mid-17th century sources, but is found as the ‘Rabbit Burrow of Ballyteigue’ by 1794. Even in the part of Co. Wexford noted for the archaic nature of the English dialect spoken there into the 19th century (see T.P. Dolan & Diarmaid Ó Muirithe, The Dialect of Forth and Bargy, Co. Wexford, Ireland), it would appear that the shift from coney to rabbit had already occurred by the 18th century at least.

Further illustrations of the rising popularity of the word rabbit in place of coney/coning in the English dialect spoken in Ireland was its occasional spread to surnames. The native Irish surname Ó Coinín was initially anglicized phonetically, e.g. Conyeen, Cuneen, Cunneen, Cunnien, but as the language shift to English approached, by the ‘translation’ Rabbit/Rabbitte (see P. W. Woulfe, Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall s.n. Ó Coinín). Thus we find that Carrowconeen / Ceathrú Uí Choinín ‘the quarter of Ó Coinín’ (logainm.ie #34670) was called ‘Rabbithill’ on Bald’s map of Co. Mayo (c. 1817). Only by a hair’s breadth did this placename, then, avoid becoming another victim to the odd pseudo-translation that sometimes occurred in Irish placenames and surnames, and seems to have been particularly common in Cos. Mayo and Roscommon in the early 19th century.

This pseudo-translation of Ó Coinín as Rabbit/Rabbitte, brings us back to the subject of last month’s note, our friend the giorria ‘hare’, by way of another even more bizarre anglicization. The surname Mag Fhearaígh ‘descendant of Fearaíoch’, deriving from a personal name originally meaning ‘manly’ (Early Modern Irish Fearadhach), was commonly anglicized as McGarry and McGerry, etc. However, a perceived similarity in pronunciation of [Ma]g Fhearaígh and giorria “hare” also led to its being ‘translated’ as (O’) Hare (Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall s.n. Mag Fhearadhaigh)! Thus, most of the examples of the surnames Rabbit and (O’)Hare in Ireland have nothing to do with our furry friends. (The unrelated Árainn surname Ó hEithir seems to be a variant of Ó hAichir.)

The endless examples of this type of pseudo-translation can come across as pleasantly diverting, but in fact they are relics of the traumatic language shift which dealt the final blow to Gaelic Ireland.

(Conchubhar Ó Crualaoich & Aindí Mac Giolla Chomhghaill)

Carrowconeen / Ceathrú Uí Choinín ‘the quarter of Ó Coinín’ (logainm.ie #20889)

Carrowconeen / Ceathrú Uí Choinín
‘the quarter of Ó Coinín’ (logainm.ie #20889)