placenamesBurren
Boirinn
Lewis recorded the harbour’s fleet and its role as shelter in rough weather.
The name
A reliable full-name meaning has not been established here. The recorded Irish and English forms are given without an unsupported translation.
Recorded forms
- Boirinn · Irish · main form · non-validated name
- Na Grágáin · Irish · main form · historical name
- Burren · English · main form
Place & story
A working harbour and a refuge
Samuel Lewis’s 1837 Burren village account records thirty hookers and 150 yawls frequenting the harbour called New Quay, with about five hundred men employed in its fishery. Corn, butter, sheep and pigs were shipped there too. He also reported occasions when a hundred small sailing craft sheltered in the harbour during bad weather. These figures describe the particular harbour’s activity, not a fleet for the whole Burren barony. [2]
Geographic information
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Burren. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Burren or Burrin: A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837) · Samuel Lewis
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2026-09-19. How this page was prepared.