Where is Athenry?

Subject: Where is Athenry?
From: Noel P
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 11:11 AM

In the song "The Fields of Athenry" most appear to accept as fact that "Athenry" is located about 12 miles east of Galway city. I am not so sure. There is no harbour there nor would the harbour of Galway be visable from there. I heard someone else say that in was in Co. Cork. Any inside knowledge?

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Fibula Mattock
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 11:21 AM

Yup, it's near Galway. Nope, there's no harbour. This puzzled me for ages 'til I decided that:
a) she could have travelled to Galway to watch "the prison ship sail out against the bay"; and
b) I really hate that song!

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 11:23 AM

r348 east of Galway on the way to Ballinasloe. It's not as far as Tuam, and we drove around Galway all afternoon, and hit both. Not far, quoi. Not sure of the county but I think it's still Clare.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Fiolar
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 11:26 AM

Athenry is approximately 16 kilometres east of Galway City on the R348. There is no Athenry in County Cork. The song is correct in that the two people mentioned in it are remembering the times that they spent together in the area around the little town. He, the husband had been imprisoned probably in jail in Galway to await transportation. The person telling the story is relating what he heard while walking past. I'll check the words when I get a chance, but I'm nearly sure I'm correct.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 01:19 PM

It's in the DigiTrad data base under, oddly enough, Fields of Athenry.

Here are the words as sung by Paddy Reilly on The Essential Irish Folk Collection:

By a lonely prison wall, I heard a young girl calling
"Michael, they have taken you away,
For you stole Trevelyan's corn,
So the young might see the morn.
Now a prison ship lies waiting in the bay."

CHO:
Low lie the fields of Athenry
Where once we watched the small free birds flying
Our love was on the wing
We had dreams and songs to sing
It's so lonely round the fields of Athenry.

By a lonely prison wall, I heard a young man calling
"Nothing matters, Mary, when you're free
Against the famine and the crown,
I rebelled, they cut me down.
Now you must raise our child with dignity."

CHO:

By a lonely harbor wall, she watched the last star falling
As the prison ship sailed out against the sky
For she lived to hope and pray
For her love in Botany Bay
It's so lonely round the fields of Athenry.

CHO:

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 01:22 PM

In the chorus, second line, that should be "fly," not "flying." Sorry.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Yorkie
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 02:21 PM

Noel P, I agree with Fiolar: the couple are remembering the times they spent around Athenry before he was sentenced to deportation for stealing corn. There were prison ships in many ports in the eighteenth/ early nineteenth century, and people's "crimes" were often trivial.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 02:31 PM

Written by Pete St. John, of course.

Regards

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 03:08 PM

It's a song about the Famine; he's in Galway prison, his wife is mourning the fact that he's awaiting transportation to Australia; their home is in Athenry, east Galway. Clear?

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Jimmy C
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 03:42 PM

Athenry (Ath-na-riogh) the Ford Of The Kings is in Galway as stated above by Fiolar and others.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 04:59 PM

Been through it, it's as boring as the song got. Haven't heard it for a year now, so I might actually like it again. It was spoiled for me because one of the people I was travelling through Ireland with said 'hey let's sing the song we know about the places we travel through'. Consequently we got Dublin's fair city all through that place, 'Galway shawl' all through the county, 'Fields of Athenry' at said place and anything that mentioned the river Shannon as we were ferried across it. She shut up when we got to Limerick.......

LTS

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: SINSULL
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 05:04 PM

Love it. Matt_R does an admirable job of it on his first tape. Maybe Liz can coax him into it on Paltalk.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: bill\sables
Date: 27 Feb 01 - 09:15 PM

I played two nights in Athenry in 1990 when everybody was singing the song. most of the gift shops and every other shop and pub was selling tea towels, plates, cups, tee shirts, aprons, key rings, in fact anything they could print the words of the song on, and most of the tourists were searching for the harbour wall.
Bill

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: UB Ed
Date: 01 Mar 01 - 09:37 AM

The reference to Trevelyan's corn is possibly a reference to the Chief Secretary to Ireland at that time. Trevelyan followed Forster (SP?) after Parnell disposed of him. I believe Trevlyan took office around 1881, 1882.

My chronological understanding of Irish history is quite muddled. I believe this was a period when the landlords were evecting tennants left and right and the land wars began. I'm also assuming the whole situation was exacerbated by famine.

Am I on the right track? Anybody with a clearer perspective?

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Fiolar
Date: 01 Mar 01 - 02:01 PM

It's possible but hardly likely that the Trevelyan is Charles Edward Trevelyan who was Assistant Secretary to the Treasury at the time of the Famine in the 1840s. He set up a Famine Relief Scheme in 1847/48 and his main object was not so much relief as to minimise the cost to the Treasury. For example - "the able bodied only could get relief in a workhouse. Non-able bodied could get relief outside the workhouse and retain their homes." By February 1848 450,000 and by June 830,000 were receiving outdoor relief. However food was only distributed at workhouses and many people had to walk scores of miles to get to such a centre. Most were weak from hunger anyway. Another little twist was called the "quarter acre clause." People with a small-holding could only get relief if they gave up their land. For the period 1848/49 he went one better. There would be no Treasury grants to distressed Unions and the outdoor feeding of destitute children was to stop in order to encourage "independence." Indian meal or maize was also imported to Ireland as a substitute food source. I suppose it might be called "corn" but to the best of my knowledge it was known as "yellow meal" and was not popular. To get back to the original line, it is likely that the name "Trevelyan" had nothing to do with the monster above but was just a phrase to make the song flow along. In any case, transportation from the British Isles ceased in 1868. Trust the above is of some enlightenment albeit a bit long winded.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Noreen
Date: 01 Mar 01 - 02:31 PM

From The Grateful Dead lyrics pages (?!) With quote from Pete St.John (who wrote it in 1888, according to another site google found for me!)

The song was written in 1979 and recorded by Paddy Reilly, whose best-selling single launched an album of the same name. However, over the past 17 years more than 400 cover versions have been made with conservative estimates on single sales put at five million. The song was based on a true story of the fate of one young couple during the Irish famine.

The song tells the story of Lord Trevelyan who brought a supply of corn back from America in a bid to battle starvation during the potato famine in the mid-nineteenth century. Unfortunately it was Indian corn too hard to be milled, so useless. However, local people thought it would save them and so broke into the stores, were arrested, and subsequently deported to Australia.

"The song could be about anyone Scots, Irish, English. It is about poor innocent people and how they are victims of natural disasters. It's easy to say why it's been so popular in Glasgow because in 1846, the year the song's set, over 150,000 Irishmen, women, and children fled to the city where many were treated with generosity. But I've heard the song sung everywhere from San Francisco to Melbourne."

Also mentions that there was a call for the song to be banned at Parkhead where Glasgow Celtic supporters sing it to wind up the Rangers supporters...

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Amanda R.
Date: 13 Nov 01 - 07:33 PM

In response to the above post about Trevalyan, I'm quite sure that (metaphorically, of course) this is a reference to Lord Trevalyan, of famine relief policy fame/infamy.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: UB Ed
Date: 13 Nov 01 - 11:01 PM

Amanda, I agree. The song was written in 1979, about something that happened in the 1840's. I simply need to resolve my chronological issue of Trevalyan as Chief secretary in the 1880s, which, of course would not preclude him from being an Assistant Secretary to the Treasury in the 1840's.

That being said, I think I recall Famine in the 1880's as well.

Amanda, welcome to the 'Cat. Get ye to the membership!

Ed

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Blackcatter
Date: 14 Nov 01 - 12:11 AM

Oh for pete's sake...

We cleared this up last year:

The "Fields of Athenry" is not about a town - it's about the actual fields of a particular strain of Grecian rye grass that were common in Ireland in the mid-Nineteenth Century.

So there!

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: bill\sables
Date: 14 Nov 01 - 06:11 AM

Blackcatter is correct. It is about a type of grass seed called Athen Rye which, like the shamrock only grows in Ireland. In the gift shops you will find little packets of Athen Rye sold at very high prices and aimed at the American and Japanese tourists.
Bill

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Stavanger Bill
Date: 14 Nov 01 - 06:46 AM

See above mail re: Quote from Pete St.John (who wrote it in 1988)

Also from Cecil Woodham-Smith's book "The Great Hunger" which covers the time of the famine (1847 to 1851)

The Trevelyan is Charles Edward Trevelyan who was Assistant Secretary to the Treasury at the time of the Famine. The famine was not restricted to Ireland and affected the whole of Europe. The reason that its effects were less severe elsewhere than in Ireland was due to greater variety in crops grown - in certain parts of Ireland the dependence on the potatoe was almost total. Other countries affected by the famine bought grain and other cereal crops from America to suppliment shortages at home. Britain (Trevelyan) through agents for Barings Bank in America purchased Indian Corn the only crop available in sufficient quantities. According to the author, there were very few recorded instances of people stealing the corn. In a post-script Woodham-Smith gives an account of Trevelyan's career after the famine. He never returned to any post associated with Ireland. He was sent out to India where on at least two occasions he had to deal with famine. These he dealt with fairly successfully by applying the lessons he had learned dealing with the famine in Ireland. The main difference in India being that his hands were not tied, as they had been in Ireland, and he was free to deal with both cause and effect.

The worst famine in recent times was in Ethiopia in the mid 80's where thousands continued to die each day even after the "international community" was made aware and were pouring in aid with the assistance of modern communications,trucks, helicopters and aircraft. During Trevelyan's time, particularly on the west coast of Ireland, he had very few developed ports, poor roads and the only means of transport required more feed than those who had to be fed.

Subject: ADD: Wheat & Rye (Athenry parody)
From: Dead Horse
Date: 14 Nov 01 - 01:37 PM

Cobblers. The song is a parody of my original entitled *Fields Of Wheat & Rye*

WHEAT & RYE
(Dead Horse)

By a broken down stone wall, I heard an old girl calling
Albert, they have taken you away
Since the sheep they have all gone, through the post came lots of porn
And the Council Tax you did refuse to pay

Low lie the fields of wheat & rye
Where once we shot small birds up on high
We shot them as they flew, then we put them into a stew
Or else we ate them in a crusty pie

Near a smelly old pig sty, I heard a farm hand crying
Nothing matters Mavis, when you're pissed
The cows have got B.S.E. I've spent the grant from the E.E.C.
And the farmers got his knickers in a twist

Down by the five bar gate, I heard the farmer stating
Albert, I will break your ruddy neck
The cows have all got out, and the milkmaids up the spout
You've turned my brand new tractor into a wreck

Beside the old dung heap, I saw the policemen creeping
They were searching for my stash I'd hid nearby
Sniffer dogs were on my trail, I'd soon be heading for jail
It's so lonely hiding in the fields of wheat & rye

Low lie the fields of wheat & rye
Where once we shot small birds up on high
We shot them as they flew, then we put them into a stew
Or else we ate them in a crusty pie

I would sue, but I can't afford a lawyer!!!

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: UB Ed
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 01:33 AM

Black catter, thanks for jumpimg into this thread last February and giving us the link to the "seed" thread. Can you imagine how much additional time we'd wasted had you not been engaged?

These are genuine posts. If you have past knowledge to share, then do so in a way we can harvest. Got a link?

Ed

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,IrishDa
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 01:50 AM

Imagine if you will, having to steal food to feed your child. Guess what? It's been done and is still being done. Imagine being punished for it. Imagine being sent away never to see your child or family again, for the sole crime of trying to keep them alive. If you don't like the song, don't sing it. But don't be a song snob about it. Keep it to yourself. Same with "Danny Boy." If you can't imagine or sympathise with a parent's grief over a lost son, leave it alone. If you sing songs you don't like or can't understand, nobody will want to hear them anyway. If you don't sing them, better for all. If you want to be a snob about such things, perhaps you should find a new venue. Folk is people singing about what really matters to them, or attempting to preserve something they feel is worth preserving. Either way, it's best to sing about what you know. The tune may not be new and the lyrics may not be artistic. If the feeling's there, it will probably be appreciated. And if it's not, at least you'll know you've done your best.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Blackcatter
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 02:18 AM

I just checked...

Going back 3 years, there has been 12 threads with the word Athenry in the title (I believe all are discussing the same song). Hell, I even started one last April, though to be fair is wasn't to discuss the song itself or to try and understand it, but to question about a new way it appears to be being played at least in a few bars in Dublin (quickly, rousingly, and with seeming merriment from the audience).

I for one love to see the same old subject brought up in new threads, because I have a terrific memory and .. ummm .. what was I going to say ... oh yeah! - if I said something funny, I get to say it all over again!

Such as this: I made a typo in that last thead about the song "Wild Rover" - I asked about the derivation of some crowds yelling (during a pause in the chorus): "Right up your klit!" - I, of course, meant KILT. Since I love laughing at myself - that kept me happy for days...

I'll shut up now as the nurse is coming to give me my medicat

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Stavanger Bill
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 05:30 AM

Hi Dead Horse,

Absolutely hilarious - Great. Now the main question - can we use it?????

All the best

Bill

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Dead Horse
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 02:47 PM

main question - can we use it????? Not without a virtual license, Bill. I'll send you one as soon as I get virtual royalties;-) Seriously, only too flattered.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,BigDaddy
Date: 15 Nov 01 - 04:38 PM

main question, Dead Horse - can we borrow your name to rename some of the other threads here?

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Robert Anthony Tinniswood Smith
Date: 28 May 10 - 07:55 PM

Does it matter wher athenry is, if you have heard the song then you will appreciate it thet this song is not worth anything, it is boring especially when sung in a public house.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Reiver 2
Date: 28 May 10 - 09:54 PM

I'm looking at John Percival's book, "The Great Famine: Ireland's Potato Famine, 1845-1851." According to his account England's Tory Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel, when the potato blight appeared in 1845, had two shiploads of Indian Corn [maize] imported from the U.S. which was sold at "one penny a pound." Peel chose it because it was the cheapest food available, but it was a grain that was unfamiliar to the Irish and became known in Ireland as "Peel's Brimstone," due to it's bright yellow color when ground that looked like sulphur

Peel's Assistant Secretary at the Treasury, was Charles Trevelyan and was effectively the person in control of all famine relief in Ireland. He's described as "an able man... conscientious and hard working," but with "a number of failings which were to have unhappy consequences for the Irish poor." Incongruously, Trevellan was later knighted for his "services during the famine!" Whether the song's reference to stealing "Trevellan's corn" is in reference to the imported maize is not clear.

One of the tragic aspects of the famine was that it did not directly effect eastern Ireland, and food stuffs continued to be exported from Ireland to England and other countries all during the famine. Trevellan had a hand in that as well as he refused to prohibit these exports, believing, much like today's "Teabaggers" in the U.S.,that to "interfere" with the "free market" and "private enterprise" would be worse than letting people starve to death.

My wife and I stayed at a Bed and Breakfast just outside Athenry in 2001, choosing to stop there so we could get a look at "The Fields of Athenry." It was dusk when we got in and when we got up in the morning it was so foggy that we weren't able to see much of the fields! It seems to be quite clear that the song itself is fiction but describes what was a not uncommon occurrance and makes use of an actual setting [Athenry and the nearby harbor of Galway] and of the role of a real person, Charles Trevellan. Personally, I think it's a fine and lovely song. But then I've never had to listen to it sung repeatedly over and over.

Reiver 2

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: sharyn
Date: 29 May 10 - 09:33 PM

Beautiful melody and lovely possibilities for harmonies on the chorus. Too bad some people have heard it ad nauseum (I love the song for the above reasons).

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 29 May 10 - 10:48 PM

The song is also sung with enthusiasm at Irish rugby matches, sometimes by thousands of supporters in chorus.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Rog Peek
Date: 30 May 10 - 03:31 AM

It's particularly prevalent at Munster Rugby matches.

Rog

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Jackie
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 08:48 AM

Athenry is in east galway on the main dublin galway train line. I grew up there and yes this song is about my town. The boats with prisoners supposedly left at derrydonnell which has athenry address check it out.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,kendall
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 01:38 PM

Trash it if you must, but I like it. The harmonies in the chorus are quite nice.
The Irish have many sad songs and they have had much to be sad about.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: dick.hamlet
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 11:32 AM

The song is sung as a "fight song" for Co. Galway teams,
particularly in Gaelic games like Irish football. It's a
particularly poor fight song. Even Liverpool's use of
"When you walk through a storm" is better.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Murpholly
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:25 PM

Husband and I were just about to enter the castle at Athenry when the twin towers went down. The staff were really worried about friends who were working their summer holidays over there. We looked round the castle and visited one or two more places before going back to the friends we were staying with to see what was happening. A holiday never to be forgotten. Americans stuck and not able to fly home. Cousins visited worried about brothers in New York. Do sing song occasionally but brings very many "modern" memories to the fore.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Richard
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:31 PM

This is, perhaps, the ultimate plastic paddy song.

Perhaps people could avoid singing it if they don't know where Athenry is? That way, we might at least hear a lot less of it.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:31 PM

I hope I will never hear the song again.Seems like it could be a Bluegrass song.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:42 PM

'Plastic Paddy song'?

You mean you can't go to Croke Park or Landsdowne Road if you're a real Irishman.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: billybob
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:44 PM

Oh Dick I like it......when sung in harmony. My cousins wife ownes a deserted farmhouse just outside the town and may rebuild one day so I could have a holiday there one day?
ps will you sing it next time I see you? Pretty please! :-)

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Richard I
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 02:53 PM

I'm almost certain (having dug around in this particular subject) that the fans at Croker and Landsdowne road picked it up from Celtic Park, which has the earliest records of the song being sung.

It is, I suppose, an example of "cultural recursion", as the home community picks up on the culture of those who imagine themselves as a disapora.

My own feeling about this song (as second generation Irish, hence probably a plastic paddy myself) is that it's fine to evoke the famine at sports events, so long as one can also put up with "the famine song", often a cause of controversy.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 22 Feb 11 - 03:09 PM

Or they might have picked it up from Thormonde Park (or the GAA counterpart). I think I heard it first from Munster supporters.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 23 Feb 11 - 08:38 AM

The definitive answer: 'SoA' is of course, a parody of my own song, which is guaranteed to bring tears to the eyes of any musicians within earshot:


STREETS OF PECKHAM RYE

By Catford cop-shop wall,
I heard some geezer calling,
Leroy, they have taken you away,
For you nicked a bottle of gin, from the shop that it was in,
And now they've gone and checked your DNA.

And low lie the streets of Peckham Rye,
Where once we watched the scruffy pigeons fly,
When we went out last night, they caught you bang to rights,
And I ain't gonna be your alibi.

By that lonely cop-shop wall,
I heard a young chav calling,
Kevin, I have got to get away,
'Cos my girlfriend's got a flat, I can hide away in that,
Till it's safe to come back home to Peckham Rye.

And low lie the streets of Peckham Rye,
Where once we watched the scruffy pigeons fly,
Don't give me loads of grief, just find a decent brief,
So I can go back home to Peckham Rye.

As he walked back through Milwall,
Where kebab shops smell appalling,
Kevin thought of Leroy's girlfriend, May,
She's well fit and she's a goer,
And the more he thought it over,
He fancied seeing Leroy put away.

And low lie the streets of Peckham Rye,
Where once we watched the scruffy pigeons fly,
Now Leroy's prison bound, but Kevin's still around,
Still thieving on the streets of Peckham Rye.

Athenry is, incidentally, probably the least attractive town in Galway.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 23 Feb 11 - 04:06 PM

I do not see how a civilized person can call anyone a plastic paddy. mg

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,Athenry Girl
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 05:45 AM

I'm from Athenry.
Athenry is no where near the harbour of Galway and you can't even see it from there.
Athenry has loads of people living in it and it is well known for the secondary schools there, where many people from the catchment area attend.

Athenry is unreal, and if your saying its not go there and find out.


And NO its not in Cork.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: GUEST,hi
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 05:48 AM

Athenry is a town, In Galway, In Connacht, In Ireland.

I should know I live here.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Lox
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 06:15 AM

There is no doubt that "Trevellyans corn" refers to the Maize imported for "famine Relief", even though it is more accurate to point out that that Trevellyans policy was to encourage the Irish free market to solve the issue of famine, and he locked up the imported maize that was there and turned away fresh shipments.

It should also be noted, that unlike famine relief today, victims of famine had to buy their corn - a slightly disingenuous form of relief, as they would happily have bought food if they had had money in the first place.

The whole event is a perfect example of the realities of laissez faire/ trickle down economics at its most callous, not to mention the myopic total lack of comprehension from the public school educated millionaires who took turns at running the British Government at the time.

Subject: RE: Where is Athenry?
From: Vic Smith
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 08:49 AM

NOT THE FIELDS ATHENRY
By Malcolm Austen 1993

By a lonely prison wall
I heard a young girl calling
Michael they are singing it again
And it just goes on and on
And I hate that blooming (bloody) song
I'm so fed-up with the fields of Athenry

ch.
Oh no not the fields of Athenry
If I hear it one more time I'm going to cry
They should ban the flaming (bloody) thing
There are far better songs to sing
I'm so fed-up with the fields of Athenry

By a lonely prison wall
I heard a young man calling
Mary why do you think that I'm in here
I hit the singer with my shillelagh
Now I'm bound for old Australie
But no more I'll hear the fields of Athenry

By a lonely harbour wall
I heard a young girl calling
To a prison ship and saying wait for me
Won't you let me come along
Before they start that blooming (bloody) song
I'm so fed up with the fields of Athenry

I hope Malcolm sings this when he is appearing with Moira Craig at Seaford Folk Club on Friday.