placenamesCaher
An Chathair
Lewis described a factory employing women to make straw products, including woven straw and silk.
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
- An Chathair · Irish · main form · validated name
- Caher · English · main form
Place & story
A relief initiative becomes a factory
The London Relief Committee established a straw-plait manufactory at Cahir in 1822, under the patronage of the Earl and Countess Dowager of Glengall. Samuel Lewis credited John Parry of London with proposing the enterprise. Its products went chiefly to London wholesalers. When one of those firms failed in 1828, the factory’s business suffered; assistance from the Earl enabled proprietor Richard Butler to continue production. [2]
Straw woven with silk
By 1837, newly introduced looms were making decorative plaits of Italian straw mixed with silk. Lewis recorded sixty-eight women employed in this particular branch, with plans to expand it. That figure describes the straw-and-silk weaving operation, rather than the factory’s entire workforce. [2]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Civil parish
- County
- Tipperary
- Barony
- Iffa and Offa West
- Barony
- Iffa and Offa East
- Coordinates
- 52.37116, -7.90863
- Mapped area
- 54.29 km²
- Logainm ID
- 2252 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Caher. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Cahir or Caher: A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837) · Samuel Lewis
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2025-01-10. How this page was prepared.