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Most people of this name in Ireland spell it as above, though
occasionally the variant Grier is used; these and also Grierson are basically
the same, being anglicized forms of the Scottish MacGregor, which is found
unchanged in Co. Derry. Greer is very numerous in Co. Antrim now and it occurs
many times in the Hearth Money Rolls for that county (1669) and to some extent
also in the rolls of other Ulster counties. The principal families of the name
came to Ireland in the seventeenth century, the earliest in the Plantation of
Ulster and others a generation later. Derry-born Samuel McCurdy Greer
(1810-1880), who ended as county court judge of Cavan and Leitrim, was
co-founder of the Tenant League in 1850 with Charles Gavan Duffy.
GLOSSARY
| Clan |
From the Gaelic clann which means literally
'children'. |
| Mac- |
From the Gaelic mac, meaning 'son' |
| O' |
From the Gaelic Ó, meaning 'grandson',
'grandchild' or 'descendant'; Ní is the femine form of Ó, meaning 'daughter' or
'descendant' |
| Plantation (Ulster) |
The redistribution of escheated lands after the
defeat of the Ulster Gaelic lords and the 'Flight of the Earls' in 1607. Only
counties Donegal, Derry, Tyrone, Armagh, Fermanagh and Cavan were actually
'planted', portions of land there being distributed to English and Scottish
families on their lands and for the building of bawns. |
| Sept |
A family group of shared ancestry living in the
same locality |
| Undertakers |
Powerful English or Scottish landowners who
undertook the plantation of British settlers on the lands they were granted. |
| Gaelic |
This word in Ireland has no relation to
Scotland. As a noun it is used to denote the Irish language, as an adjective
to denote native Irish as opposed to Norman or English origin. |
| Erenagh |
From the Irish Gaelic airchinneach, meaning
'hereditary steward of church lands'. A family would hold the ecclesiastical
office and the right to the church or monastery lands, the incumbent at any one
time being the erenagh. |
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