The inhabitants of our Island are renowned for their gift of storytelling, for the lyrical construction of their daily talk, and for their unique literary achievements. This fondness for the “word” is deeply rooted within the population. The ancient poets, who preserved the old traditions of the people, carried considerable status within the community. As Francis Byrne said “There can be little doubt that the influence which they exerted so effectively for over a thousand years was rooted in ancient belief in the power of the word”.
The varieties of English spoken in Ireland have their origins in the Elizabethan period. This period was one of the most vibrant of the English language and included Shakespeare and his contemporaries. The “English” that the Irish adopted and adapted still preserves some seventeenth century peculiarities, pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. It is far closer to that rich heritage than the English of modern Britain.
Hiberno-English has both northern and southern versions, due to the dialect differences in the original Gaelic of the two areas. The persuasive influence of Gaelic upon our pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and idiom is still quite evident in daily speech. “He is in bed with the leg, so he is; he is after writing; there is a great buying on the cows the day; it’s mad in the head you are; it was dead she was; she has a definite cold on her, so she has”. Many of these turns of phrases arise from the literal translational of the Gaelic.
Gaelic may have been the ultimate loser in the language battle but it has found ways of making English in its own image. Gaelic heritage also survives in Ulster. Place and personal names, e.g. Shankill and Craig. In fact there are more of these names of Gaelic derivation in Ulster than anywhere else in Ireland.
Northern Hiberno-English was also considerably influenced by the introduction of Scottish dialects. Indeed much of the distinctive vocabulary of the North is of Scottish origin including such Ullans words as scunder (sicken), thole (endure), byre, corn, dander (stroll), lift (steal) and mind (remember). English, Gaelic and Scottish dialects have all attributed significantly to the shared heritage of the Ulster people particularly in Donegal , where all three languages may be heard in the home. As Estyn Evans said of the Protestant Northerners “They’ve inherited a material culture and idiom that has a stamp of this country on it and I like to think of a very paradoxical figure, an Orangeman from the Bannside waving a British flag and pouring scorn on the English man because he can’t get his tongue round a good Gaelic place name like Ahoghill.”
Nowhere was the blending of our Scottish Heritage with our Irish heritage more significant than in Ulster’s contribution to the birth of America. Severe economic pressure, increased rent demands from absentee English Landlords and Government discrimination against Presbyterians as well as Catholics led, from 1717 to a great migration from Ulster to America. By the time America declared Independence a quarter of a million Ulster people had emigrated there and were estimated to have composed 15% of the population. Because of their dual ancestry these Ulster folk were to be become known as the Scotch Irish. They had a profound impact on their new homeland.
It has been said that the Scotch Irish made three contributions to Colonial America. They settled a frontier, they founded the Kirk and they built the school. It was they more than any other group who created the first western frontier. The Reverend Francis Makemie (1658–1708) was born into the Ulster Scots community in Ramelton, County Donegal. He went on to become a clergyman and was ordained by the Presbytery of the Laggan, in West Ulster, in 1682. At the call of Colonel William Stevens, an Episcopalian from Rehobeth, Maryland, he was sent as a missionary to America, arriving in Maryland in 1683. He is considered to be the founder of Presbyterianism in the United States of America.
To the Ulster Scotch much largely go the credit of being the first pioneers west of the Appalachians in opening up the Mississippi valley. Not only were they predominantly among the pioneers-the mother of the first white child born west of the Rockies was Catherine O’Hare from Rathfriland, but they carried with them an important part of their cultural heritage, their music. Whatever their influence in terms of cabin and barn styles, field lay-out, town planning and so on, it seems likely that the greatest and most lasting contribution of the Scotch Irish was music.
However one may define their particular religious and ethnic identity musically they should be considered Ulstermen for they brought with them the mixture of Scottish and Irish tunes which is still characteristic of large parts of old Ulster. From the Hillbilly music of the Appalachian Billy Boys or followers of King William, which became Bluegrass, to the Soul music of the Gaelic singers of Donegal and the Hebrides, which became Rhythm and Blues, we have reached the heavens in the transcendental music of Van Morrison
To be continued