I'm from County Antrim in the north of Ireland and the song has long been a favourite of mine. My mother used to quote lines of the poem to me when I was a child. She said that it reminded her of her own hometown in County Louth. I always wondered about the origin of the song and the whereabouts of Spancilhill. Thanks to your thread I have been enlightened. I plan to visit the area as a tourist in the summer of 2004.

Earlier I read that the name Spancil Hill came from the spancilling or tying of two of the legs of an animal together with a short rope. This is true. The technique was used on sheep and goats to keep them from breaking out of one's fields into a neighbour's pasture. In rural Ireland land is so jealously guarded that much quarrelling between neighbours and wrangling in court has been caused by straying animals. The attitude is that 'your sheep are not going to get fat on my grass.'