From the works of Woulfe and MacLysaght, I knew that Irish
surnames are often associated with particular localities. Many
are of very long standing and are probably as old as any
surnames in the world. Yet I had not seen distribution maps or
core area definition or any data on numbers or 'market shares'
in particular areas. The idea of enumerating and mapping Irish
surnames came to me when I was working on trade area projections
for new retail and leisure schemes. The proposed attractions
would draw customers over national and linguistic boundaries.
Amongst other discriminators, telephone numbers in the expected
trade area were quite obviously a good proxy for the
neighbourhood and therefore the nationality of a particular
household. Equally obviously, a phone code analysis could be
used to enumerate and analyse the distribution of individual
surnames in Ireland. Results of the 1991 census for both the
Republic and the North were coming on stream and could provide a
backdrop against which surname numbers coul