Lakeview and Lydacan townland minor placenames

The minor placenames of the townlands of Lakeview and Lydacan, in the parish of Claregalway, Co. Galway

The townlands of Lakeview and Lydacan are located to the south of the River Clare, and cover an area of approximately 353 and 852 acres respectively. Much of the modern village of Claregalway is in fact situated in the townland of Lakeview, with this townland and the townland of Claregalway seeing the greatest amount of change and urban development in recent decades.

The landscape of these townlands rises gently when moving south from the river, with the exposed summit of this elevation giving us the Irish name for Lakeview: Droim na Gaoithe – the windy ridge. The placename Lydacan is known from at least 1578 when it is recorded as ‘Lydeacan’ in the Tudor Fiants. We find in the townland of Lydacan, the remains of a tower house and an associated bawn wall, hidden amongst the tumbling ruins of the later Lydacan House, indicating that there has been castellated settlement here since at least the 16^th century, though possibly even earlier. Elements of the surrounding bawn wall survive in the form of gun-loops in the property boundary. The earlier castle was replaced by Lydacan House: a residence of the Lynch family in the 1770s.

The high ground of Lydacan was also the site of multiple ringforts and stone-built cashels of likely early medieval date. These defended farmsteads preceded any castle here. An intricate radial field system which surrounded a stone cashel once underlay rough gorse at the centre of the townland (Páirc Garbh), but this was cleared in the-20^th century. An image captured in the Cambridge University Collection of Aerial Photography in July 1969 offers a tantalising glimpse of the striking fort that once stood here. If not in scale and dramatic setting, then in layout, it appeared to resemble the elaborate, high-status settlement of Cahercommaun in The Burren of Co. Clare.

When interviewed in 1991, local man James O’Dea had the following recollection of the clearance works at the site:

The Lisheen is in the heart of Lydican. There was a big commonage in Lydican before the land was divided and there is one of those old forts in it. And there is an underground passage in it. Now the Lisheen is a round place and there was a big wide wall around it – it was like a place that there was an old fort or something one time. It’s all covered up with bushes. The commonage was divided around 20 or so years ago and before we divided it we said the Lisheen would be left.

The name Lydacan (An Laighdeacán) has been interpreted as ‘a small division’. However, the southern portions of Lydacan townland where it borders the townland of Carnmore East are also known locally today as Tónruadh– the red bottom.

At the time of the Ordnance Survey in the 1830s, Lakeview was recorded in the Ordnance Survey Name Books as being ‘the property of Mr. Lynch. It is all under tillage. At its north end is a large island which… …is subject to winter flood. There stands a R. C. Chapel near its northwest end, part of which is bounded by the road from Galway to Tuam’. In the same source Lydacan was recorded as ‘the property of Mr. Lynch of Galway. Half this townlands surface is covered with limestone rocks, the remainder under tillage. There stands a substantial building near its west side, the residence of Mr. Gunning. A small portion of the north end of this townland is subject to Winter floods’.

Our work in the townland during 2021 identified 53 minor placenames and places of interest known locally within the townlands. These placenames were collected by Marie Dempsey from Martin Cormican, George Glynn, Pat Walsh, and Tommy and Paddy Joe Moran. The placenames collected refer to fields, wells, houses, bótharíns, and other elements of the landscape of Lydacan House Estate in particular.