Abstract

This paper, presented in two separate parts, defines a select number of demographic markers for the population that comprised members of the Newgarden Meeting, County Carlow, Ireland and their descendants 1600–1900. These in turn were compared with those derived by Vann and Eversley (1992) for the Quaker population of Ireland at large with the objectives of identifying consistencies and/or evidence for regional variation within a genetic context. In part 1 the sources of data, their utility and approach to analysis were discussed and it was concluded that there were some constraints on their usage for analytical purposes. Part 1 also dealt with aspects of age at marriage, delayed marriage, occupation and marriage catchment analysis. Part 2 deals with family size, births including birth interval analysis, birth management, fertility and some aspects of age analysis. It was found, for example, that over time family sizes became smaller, marriages were delayed, lifespan gradually increased and families were sometimes planned. While many of the results outlined in the two sections of this paper parallel those of Vann and Eversley there are sufficient differences in several of the demographic markers to suggest there may have been some variation in rural Ireland from the national trends. In so far as the Newgarden/Carlow population is concerned and in contrast with results derived from the analysis of the national population, these include a tendency for females to marry earlier and males later, a greater proportion of females marrying under the age of 20 and after 1800 a trend for males to marry much younger women and a consistent trend to reduce the sizes of families over time. These and the other results, then, invite analysis of data from other regions to test this hypothesis

Keywords

birth management, mortality, birth interval analysis, Demography, age specific marital fertility index, smallpox, Newgarden, Vann and Eversley

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