County Roscommon is named after thecounty town ofRoscommon. Roscommon comes from the IrishRos meaning a wooded, gentle height andComán, the first abbot and bishop of Roscommon who founded the first monastery there in 550 AD.[5]
County Roscommon has an area of 2,548 square kilometres (984 sq mi).[1]Lough Key in north Roscommon is noted for having thirty-two islands. Thegeographical centre of Ireland is located on the western shore ofLough Ree in the south of the county.[6]
Roscommon is the third largest of Connacht's five counties by size and the second-smallest in terms of population. It ranks 11th in size of Ireland's 32 counties, but 26th in terms of population, making it the 3rd most sparsely populated county after Leitrim and Mayo. The county borders every otherConnacht county:Galway,Mayo,Sligo, andLeitrim, as well as threeLeinster counties:Longford,Westmeath, andOffaly. In 2008, a news report said that statistically, people from Roscommon have the longest life expectancy of any county on the island of Ireland.[7]
Seltannasaggart, which is located along the northern border withCounty Leitrim, is the tallest point in County Roscommon, measuring to a height of 428 m (1,404.20 ft).[8]
County Roscommon as an administrative division has its roots in the Middle Ages. With the conquest and division of theKingdom of Connacht, those districts in the east retained byKing John as "The King'sCantreds" covered County Roscommon, and parts of EastGalway. These districts were leased to the native kings of Connacht and eventually became the county. In 1585 during the Tudor re-establishment of counties under theComposition of Connacht, Roscommon was established with the South-west boundary now alongside theRiver Suck.
John O'Donovan (1806–1861), historian and scholar, visited County Roscommon in 1837, while compiling information for theOrdnance Survey. Entering St Peter's parish in Athlone in June 1837, he wrote, "I have now entered upon a region totally different from Longford, and am very much pleased with the intelligence of the people." However, he had major problems with place-names. He later wrote, "I am sick to death's door of lochawns, and it pains me to the very soul to have to make these remarks, but what can I do when I cannot make the usual progress? Here I am stuck in the mud in the middle of Loughs, Turlaghs, Lahaghs and Curraghs, the names of many of which are only known to a few old men in their immediate neighbourhood and I cannot give many of them utterance from the manner in which they are spelled."[14][15]
The 1898 Act also divided the county into the rural districts of Athlone No. 2, Ballinasloe No. 2, Boyle No. 1, Carrick-on-Shannon No. 2, Castlerea, Roscommon, and Strokestown.[18] The rural districts were abolished in 1925.[19]Boyle andRoscommon were administered locally bytown commissioners.[20] Roscommon town commissioners were abolished in 1927. After becoming atown council in 2002,[21] in common with all other town councils in Ireland, Boyle Town Council was abolished under theLocal Government Reform Act 2014.[22]
Douglas Hyde (1860–1949), scholar of the Irish language, firstPresident of Ireland (1938–45), founder of theGaelic League during the Revival of the late 19th – early 20th century, born in Castlerea and buried in the Hyde Museum,Frenchpark
^Mannion, Joseph (20 June 2019). "Elizabethan County Galway: The Origin and Evolution of an Administrative Unit of Tudor Local Government".Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society.64:64–89.JSTOR24612855.
^John O' Donovan, "Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the County of Roscommon, collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey, 1837". p. 5. Special collections section, National University of Ireland, Galway, 2009, reproduced by Rev. Michael O'Flanagan, Bray 1927.
