Follow Friday - Éirinn go Brách

As St. Patrick's Day approaches, there has been a stream of very good posts related to Irish ancestry on genealogy blogs. Even though I have no Irish ancestry (at least of the green kind), I have long been interested in Irish culture and the Irish language.

•  One of my favorite posts in the last week was the Surname Saturday post on the blog 'On a flesh and bone foundation': An Irish History. The post describes various government attempts to impose the English language and English surnames on inhabitants of Ireland.  This post points to some of the problems of assuming that the origin of a surname points to the ethnic origins of an ancestor, as they may have changed their name or adopted a new one, whether by choice or compulsion.
• Anglo-Celtic Connections had two helpful posts informing us of two new Irish collections on Ancestry.com, Belfast Newsletter 1738-1925 and Irish Probate and Marriage Index.  I plan to follow this blog closely as it focuses on topic relevant for my own research, British-Canadian genealogy.