Wednesday 9 November 2011

Discover the 1641 Depositions

If you've been paying attention – either to this blog's news events, to the NLI's blog or to Twitter – you’ll know there's a History Ireland Hedge School tonight at the National Library of Ireland in Kildare Street.

The subject 'Where does the truth lie about the 1641 Depositions?' is to be discussed with Mícheál Ó Siochrú, Jane Ohlmeyer and Eamon Darcy of Trinity College and Patrick Fitzgerald of the Ulster American Folk Park.

School starts at 7pm and you don't need to register, so just turn up. It's free, and is sure to be an interesting debate about this unique historical resource, which is made up of 8,000 witness statements.

If you can't make it, you might like to listen to this 10-minute HistoryJournal podcast of an interview with Micheál Ó Siochrú. It was recorded two years into the three-year project to transcribe and digitise this enormous collection and provides a good overview of its value and content.

You'll then want to learn more about the 1641 Depositions, how they might help your Irish genealogy research, and how to start searching the collection. There's a ton of information and full access to the database at Trinity College's dedicated website. You need to register with your email address but you're then free to search by name, by county or by free text.