Further, the farmers did not own their holdings, the islands belonged to an absentee landlord in Dublin. Loose rocks would be crafted into the famous Aran drystone walls to protect the precious soil. Holdings were not that small for rural Ireland, the mean holding size for the three islands being 11.3 ha, but the land often had to be ‘made’, by creating artificial soil on the islands’ bare limestone by spreading layers of sand and seaweed onto the rock surface. Sixty per cent of household heads worked the land, but most had to have other jobs, for agriculture on Aran was not an easy affair. Apart from full-time fishermen, mainly in Killeaney village, Inishmore, a number of labourers and some people, mainly widows, who made fishing nets, few people had only one recorded occupation. They show a subsistence, peasant society where the few resources available had to be exploited to the utmost.

The unusual survival of census documents from 1821 for the Aran Islands demonstrates this clearly. Island life was especially hard in the past. These have always been what Americans would call ‘hardscrabble’ places. The ‘island of dreams’ notion hardly applies to the small islands off the north and west coasts of Ireland.

Peig sayers grave