Researching in Ireland?

There are all sorts of blogs, books, and websites for doing Irish genealogical research. Hopefully this list will separate the wheat from the chaff and get you into some serious research.

Last Updated 3 December 2016

Blogs
Claire Santry's Irish Genealogy News - The most up to date reporting

John Grenham's Irish Roots  - An often humorous commentary on the often frustrating world that is Irish genealogy

Donna Moughty's Irish Genealogy Resources Blog - Expert posts about research sources and other observations

Books
John Grenham's Tracing Your Irish Ancestors (4th ed.) - The bible of Irish genealogy 

Dr. Edward MacLysaght's The Surnames of Ireland - Does exactly what it says on the cover

Brian Mitchell's A New Genealogical Atlas of Ireland (2nd ed.) - Confused by all the parishes? This atlas will set you straight

Dr. James Ryan's Tracing your (county) ancestors series - Get a more detailed insight whether they are from Cork, Galway, Dublin or Donegal

Kyle Betit and Dwight Radford's A Genealogist's Guide to Discovering Your Irish Ancestors - Focuses on researching the Irish in many countries

Websites - Records
Ask About Ireland - Griffith's Valuation. Do you know who Griffith was?

Ancestry.com - The biggest genealogy website in the world has a large number of Irish records

Ancestry Ireland - Focuses on Ulster and Northern Ireland (not affiliated with above)

British Newspaper Archive - Local newspapers from Ireland

Catholic Parish Registers at the NLI - Free access to digitized registers (no name index)

Familysearch - Various Irish record sets and indexes from the world's best free site. Check the Catalog section too for digitized records.

Findmypast.ie - Wide variety of records

From-Ireland.net - A colossal amount of free transcribed records from Dr. Jane Lyons.

GRO Ireland - Where to order BMD certs, hint: use the Familysearch or IrishGenealogy indexes and purchase the 4 euro copy!

GRO Northern Ireland - Same as above, but for the northern counties

Irishgenealogy.ie - Official Irish government research portal, church records, and birth, marriage, death records and indexes

Irish Genealogical Research Society - The great grand-daddy of all Irish genealogy societies also has many interesting databases.

Irish Genealogy Projects and Archives - Free transcribed records

Irish Newspaper Archives - Local and national newspapers

National Archives of Ireland - 1901 & 1911 censuses, 1821-1851 census fragments, Tithe Applotment Books, Wills 1858-1900, Calendars (indexes) of Wills and Administrations 1858-1922, pre-Griffith's Primary Valuation books and much more.

National Library of Ireland - Keepers of the hallowed parish microfilms, newspapers, an excellent advisory service and much more

Presbyterian Historical Society of Ireland - Congregational registers, records, histories and more

Public Record Office of Northern Ireland - For all your Northern Irish ancestral needs

Representative Church Body Library - A good starting place for finding Protestant (Church of Ireland) ancestors

Rootsireland - 20+ million transcribed Church and other records. An absolute must.

Ulster Historical Foundation - Irish and Scots-Irish research in Northern Ireland

Websites - Help
Boards.ie genealogy forum - Need some help? Stop by here.

Irish Genealogy Toolkit - The best online guide for Irish genealogical research.

Irish citizenship by descent - Was one of your grandparents from Ireland? All the official rules and regulations are here.

John Grenham's website - has all sorts of useful information, some free, some for payment

Swilson.info - Administrative divisions (e.g. townland databaseplacename search) and much more

The Irish Archives - Cyndi's List style website of categorized genealogy links

3 comments:

  1. Looking for information on the History of the Harty Family and following them back in time as far as possible. I notice the name Harty is not in the top one hundred Irish Surnames. It's Gaelic name is O'hAthartaight and a few other versions that eventually got the Anglican version of Harty. Books are hard to come by, most of my research is from the internet. Any suggestions on links to find out about who this family is?

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    Replies
    1. I'm looking to trace the Harty family in Ireland as far back I can can also. If you find anything please share.

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