These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
Uachtar Ard· Irish · main form · validated name
Oughterard· English · main form
Place & story
Waterfall, spa and marble
Lewis's 1837 account places Oughterard on the Galway–Clifden mail-coach road beside a river cascading over rocks above the town. Visitors came to its mineral spring, while nearby quarries supplied black marble. Barracks, a police station and revenue officers added administrative functions to the settlement. The river and the road thus supported different activities: travellers seeking the spa, local building-stone extraction and government services within the town.[2]
People & connections
The O'Flahertys at Aughnanure
Nearby Aughnanure Castle stands above the Drimneen River close to Lough Corrib. Its late-fifteenth-century tower house formed an O'Flaherty stronghold, expanded in the following century with an outer bawn and banqueting hall. Access to water connected the residence with the family's wider territory. Peadar O'Flaherty gave the property to the state in 1952. Conservation in the 1960s prepared the castle to open to the public in 1974, preserving a substantial expression of the family's earlier power.[3]
The courthouse's domestic history
Oughterard Courthouse, built in the 1840s, was designed by William Caldbeck. It served both court business and elections, but its basement was also a home. Caretaking families lived beneath the public rooms, including Delia Donnellan and later Martin and Molly Kelly. The Kelly family were its last residents. The former basement accommodation no longer survives as an open space, although the entrance and steps preserve evidence of this less visible domestic side of a civic building.[4]
Both counts use the 2016 settlement boundary, allowing like-for-like comparison. CSO supplies the 2022 count on this older boundary for comparison only. The official 2022 Built Up Area has different boundaries.
View population figures
Oughterard — Census 2016 settlement footprint — census population
These are the historical areas published in the 2006 census report. Boundaries may differ between censuses and from modern settlements. Legal towns, environs and suburbs are shown separately; none has been combined into a modern settlement total.
View population figures
Oughterard, Galway — Census town, CSO 2006 report — census population
These are the historical areas published in the 1996 census report. Boundaries may differ between censuses and from modern settlements. Legal towns, environs and suburbs are shown separately; none has been combined into a modern settlement total.
View population figures
Oughterard, Galway — Census town, CSO 1996 report — census population
Figures cover the historical town area printed in the 1986 report. Boundaries may have changed between censuses. Legal town, environs and suburb totals remain separate and differ from modern settlement boundaries.
View population figures
Oughterard, Galway — Census town, CSO 1986 report — census population
These figures use different area definitions. Read the boundary note before comparing them.
Oughterard, Galway
Published census settlement populations
1,318people · 2016
Settlement boundaries changed during this period. Differences may reflect boundary changes as well as population change. Where a 2011 legal-town-and-environs count is shown, it has not been recalculated onto the 2016 settlement boundary.
placenames