Restaurants - Archives & Libraries

Ireland has several venerable archives that can furnish the hungry geneaographical diner with a veritable smorgasbord of possibilities for hunting kith and kin.   However, like any fancy restaurant, navigating the menus aka the catalogues can leave you wondering what on earth the head chef aka the archivist is trying to serve up to you!  Archivists apparently train for many years in the black arts of designing fonds and other hierarchical devices that maintain world order in the strongroom BUT can often seem impenetrable to the humble punter clutching their shiny new library card!  Your first introduction to this arcane world is likely to be the on-line versions of the various catalogues where unfortunately treasure may be lurking under an obscurely worded entry.

So, these pages will contain both the fruits of my labours (very laboured in some instances!) and the repeated words of wisdom of those much wiser and longer in the tooth than I at recognising tasty dishes on the archival menus.