November 25th, 1997
I received the following email letter, from Aaron Golden of Galway
University in Ireland, that you may find of interest if your Goldens
are English or Irish:
Hi Bill.
Interesting website - good to see that there are plenty of
Golden's across the pond, so to speak! I came across your website
quite by accident, and had a look through it. Your knowledge of
Golden's from the 'Old Country' is essentially on the right track -
except for the bit regarding Jewish Ancestory. There are two
principal provenances of Goldens if you like, one Irish, the other
English.
The Irish (that is the original celtic language still quite well
spoken here) equivalent for Golden is Mac Ualgairg, or to give it its
full equivalent, Mac Ualgairg Ui Ruairc. The name derives from a
chief of the Ui Ruairc (or O'Rourke) sept, who were, with the
O'Reilly's, the traditional rulers of the Kingdom of Breffni, a
kingdom encompassing some 3 counties in the North West of the island,
on the border (and a very sensitive border at that, even then)
between the Provinces of Connaught and Ulster. In the 13th century,
according to the Annals of the Four Masters (an ancient historical
manuscript documenting the history of pre-Norman and early Norman
Ireland), Ualgairg Ui Ruairc (in English, Ulric O'Rourke), King of
Breffni, travelled to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, and died either there
or in Israel. To die on pilgrimage was considered an extremely
honoured way to bow out, so to speak, and in honour of him, all his
descendants had the right to refer to themselves as Son of, or
Daughter of, Ulric - Mac Ualgairg or Ni Ualgairg in the Irish tongue.
With the continuing domination of the English, and the loss of the
original Hiberno-Norman society, lets just say it became practical to
attempt to anglicise the names.. and so, dropping the Ui Ruairc, the
name went from Mac Ualgairg to Mac Goldrick, and then in some cases
to Golden... What makes things interesting is that around the time
the English were instituting essentially a colonial order here,
English and Scots were encouraged to come over and settle the land -
the Plantation its called. The vast majority of the lands that were
earmarked for plantation were those in the Province of Ulster (and we
are all reaping the consequences of that) and so there were English
settlers called Goulding that settled, many of which altered their
names to Golden. Although the first records of Jews in Ireland
actually pre-dates the Norman invasion, they never settled here (bar
several small communities in the port cities) for many practical
reasons, and their offspring were more likely to travel to England
and onto Europe. Thus Jewish origins are highly unlikely.
There are still a reasonable number of Golden's in Ireland today,
with the vast majority hailing from the north west of the country.
Ironically enough, the town of Manorhamilton in county Leitrim, whose
name in Irish is linked to the O'Rourkes has quite a number of
Golden's, but I gather that they are all of plantation stock...
Well there you go, apologies for blathering away like that... One
last thing - the Golden's that are of celtic stock, and as such are a
sept (irish clan) of the O'Rourkes of Breffni, would consequently
have the same family motto, which is simply this: Buadh. It
means,literally, victory. period.
Best regards to you and yours.
Aaron
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August 2d, 1997
Whew! It's been busy lately, what with meeting so many
other Golden family historians through the Internet. Besides
this homepage, you'll also find several other Golden
homepages, or homepages full of Goldens, maintained by
The Long
Tree House,
Karen
Tisch ,
Terry
Jenkins, and the descendants of
Samuel
Lewis Golden of the Northeast United States, primarily
in the New York region.
A new feature is ISO - In Search
Of. Send me your postings and I'll put them online.
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The genealogy of the late U.S. Senator James Stephen Golden
of Kentucky and his wife, the former Ruth S. Decker, can now be found
within the Golden-Norfleet database.
Adrian Hopkins has passed
along information on claiming military medals for three Goldens:
- Golden, Blackshir; F; 8th Reg Inf Vols
- Golden, George W.; Cpl.; K; 2nd Reg Inf Vols
- Golden, Patrick; H; 2nd Reg Vet Inf Vols
In order to claim an ancestor's medal, a claimant must submit his
or her line of descent from the veteran along with documentation to
support this line of descent. To establish line of descent, claimants
must include copies of primary sources, including birth, death,
marriage, will, deed, military, census, Bible records, etc. Old
letters, diaries, marriage announcements, or obituaries may also
prove helpful in verifying a descendant's claim. Please note that a
family chart submitted without further documentation is not
sufficient. To pursue this further go to the West Virginia States
Archives
http://www.wvlc.wvnet.edu/history/medallst.html
Question: What Internet tools are out there that will let
me manipulate and publish gedcom files to a homepage? Family Tree
Maker offers some capabilities, but this appears limited to
publishing on their own homepages. While on the subject of the
Internet, here is an interesting article
"Tracing
your roots via PC" from Technology & You columnist Steve
Wildstrom.
Best regards,
William "Bill" Golden