32 Proceedings of the Rojial Irish Academy. 



much more extensive. Guthard-dlieas stretched, in a nearly opposite direc- 

 tion, far to the west and south or Tuaim Seanchaidh, filling up the ravine 

 through which "Woodford Canal has heen constructed. 



Garadise and Ballvniagauran lakes are no longer in immediate contact, 

 though their water supply is unified by an intervening canal. They lie, in 

 fact, fully half a mile apart ; but their separation has been effected by the dis- 

 appearance of a considerable lake which, two centuries since, occupied the 

 hollow space between. In the Down Survey map this depression, amply 

 water-charged throughout, appears as an integral part of " Lough Finvoy." ^ 

 Patty's contorted Finvoy was known in mediaeval Ireland as Loch Fiun- 

 maighe,^ " the lake of the white plain," which plain was evidently Magh 

 Anghaidhe. O'Donovan equated Lough Finvoy with Garadise Lough,' but 

 in doing so he gave insufficient heed to times, and to the varying significance 

 of geographical names. Garadise, as I have shown, survived as a distinct 

 name in the seventeenth century, limited in its application to the terminal 

 basin of the lake-system at its southern end. Between this shrunken Lake 

 Garadise and Lough Dromkirk (now Ballymagauran Lake) came Lough 

 Finvoy. 



The name Fim-oy has disappeared, and all the water south of Ballinacur 

 Bridge, where the modern county road from Ballinaniore to Newtowngore 

 crosses the system, has become Lake Garadise. The tortuous defile to the 

 north, winding among limestone slopes and terraces, and sometimes opening 

 to a goodly width, has been well-nigh desiccated by the sinking of the "Wood- 

 ford Canal, though the spacious water-loops sur^"iving near both ends still 

 mark it out as a rescued lake-bottom.^ This area formed a continuation of 

 Lake Finvoy, and united the whole series of lakes from end to end into an 

 unbroken sequence. The name Finnmaighe may be assumed to have come 

 into distinctive use in connexion with the royal residence of theO'Euaircs in 

 Magh Angaidhe, just by the lake shore^ ; and there can be little doubt that 

 the earliest name of the uninterrupted water-tract lying south of Tuam 

 Seanchaidh was Garadise, or Guthard-dheas.'' 



■Sheet 118. 



-See " Ann. L. Ce," A.B. 1418. 



^ " Four Masters," a.d. 1387, note (w). 



^ This tract was still under shallow water in 1802, when it was known to M'Parlan as 

 " JTe^rtowngore Lake " (" Stat. Survey of Co. Leitrim," p. 22). 



^See, e.g., " Four Masters," 1386 and 1418 a.d. 



<■ It is possible that the names Gnthard (used for the water-formation in its entirety) 

 and Finnmaighe (applied to the narrower water-tract guarding Tuam Seanchaidh) may 

 have co-existed. 



