OK, so I fully realise that I am years behind the times, and somewhat sheepishly, I have to admit that I have only just discovered EIRCODE, the advanced Irish postcode system. My only defence is that whilst living in the Antipodes, and doing most of my correspondence by email, I have had little need for postcodes.
However, once discovered, the thought occurred to me that here might be a useful tool in family history research. My first action was to do a quick search on this forum, and I was a little surprised to find nary a skerrick.
The location of an ancestral home is most often found by reference to the Griffiths Valuation maps. It is then a simple matter to feed that location into the Eircode Finder at
eircode.ie
to obtain the correct postal address, and location by modern map or high resolution satellite pic. EIRCODE is incorporated into Google Maps, and I believe that apps are available to enable navigation on your mobile device to the actual spot.
For a member of the Clare Diaspora visiting his or her homeland this could save a huge amount of time and fuss, not that we want to encourage briefer visits, but rather allowing more time for enjoyment.
In the meantime I am attaching an EIRCODE to each Irish location that is relevant to my family history, so that I can quickly find them and easily describe them to other interested parties.
EIRCODEs and Family History
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