480 
Tipperary had capell-lands, of about 400 acres English measure, each 
capell-land containing four quarter meeres. 
Limerick reckoned by quarters, each divisible into four quarter 
meeres. It had also a sub-denomination called gnieve.* 
In Cork, we find the plowland, latinized carucata, and the gnieve or 
gneeve, a sub-denomination. 
In Kerry, the divisions were quarters and plowlands, as 1 to 3; 
each plowland estimated at 120 acres. 
In Connaught the prevailing distribution was into townlands, of 
vague import; quarters, the fourth part of the former; cartron, the 
fourth of a quarter; gnieve, the sixth of quarter. The cartron was com- 
puted at 30 native acres.} 
But, notwithstanding all the varieties of local usage, the ‘‘ town’’ 
or “ villa” was a term which was understood in all parts of Ireland; 
and 60 or 120 acres, with their appurtenances, were the prevailing 
allotments ; so that the denomination of townland easily came into uni- 
versal acceptation, and its average extent was fixed at the common rate. 
If we suppose a widely diffused population to have existed in the island 
at an early date, which the thick interspersion of the earthen duns, raths, 
and lisses, authorizes us to do, we can easily understand how, among a 
people semi-pastoral, semi-agricultural, each occupation of land would 
acquire a severalty, and become defined by ascertained limits. Our idea 
of a primitive settler would be of one who obtained a tract of land, so 
circumstanced 4s to be clear in part, and have a fair supply of running 
water, near which a habitation might be erected ; together with a pro- 
portion of mountain, wood, or bog, as the case might be. Should circum- 
stances lead the neighbouring occupants to a community of abode, their 
several farms, while they retained their distinctive appellations, would 
naturally acquire a generic name, borrowed from their joint habitation. 
An Irish memorandum in the Book of Armagh, written before the 
year 800, furnishes us with a sketch which may fairly be understood 
as representing the characteristics of a primitive townland—‘‘ Cummen 
and Brethan purchased Ochter n-Achid, with its appurtenances, both 
wood, and plain, and meadow, together with its habitation and its gar- 
den.” { Ochter n-Achid signifies ‘‘ upper-field,” and is probably the place 
now known as Oughteragh,§ in the barony of Carrigallen, county of 
* In Irish Gniomh, ‘a parcel of land,” or twelfth of a plowland. There are twenty- 
one townlands of the name, chiefly in Munster. One of them, Two Greeves, in Castle- 
magner, East Cork, contains only 713 acres ; another, called Three Gneeves, in Kilma- 
cabea, West Cork, contains 179 acres. 
+ An account of the divisions of land, principally in reference to Connaught, written 
‘by the Rev. John Keogh, is preserved in a MS. of Trinity College, Dublin (MSS. I. 
1. 2. p. 159), and has been printed by Dr. O’Donovan in the Appendix to his Tribes and 
Customs of Hy-Fiachrach, p. 453. 
{ Dirréggel Cummen acas Brethin Ochter nachid conaseilb iter fid acas mag acas 
lenu conallius acas allubgort.—fol. 17 ba. See Petrie’s Tara, in Transact. R. I. A., 
vol. xviii., pt. 2, p. 195; Stokes, Irish Glosses, p. 81, No. 580. 
§ The Calendars of Marian Gorman and O’Clery commemorate ‘ Fiadhabhair of 
Uachtar Achaidh in Cenel Luachain,” at July 7th. 
