The Parish and Population

Enfield Village 2010

The parish is identified varyingly as Rathmolyon, Enfield, Jordanstown, Rathcore or a combination of these names.  Some element of confusion is understandable, as there is a civil parish, a Church of Ireland parish and a Roman Catholic parish.  This overlapping and duplication occurs frequently and has its roots in the ad-hoc development and evolution of the Irish parish system, which has evolved from early Christian times.  The parish forms part of the Barony of Lower Moyfenrath and its boundaries are shown on the attached map.  It is acknowledged that there are various versions of spelling the names of the townlands in the parish.  Where it has been found that one version predominates in local use, then that one has been chosen for use in this book e.g. Enfield (Innfield).  Where more than one version is used in a townland, then preference has been given to that as used in the Ordnance Survey of Ireland Discovery Series of maps. 

Civil parishes in the proper sense of the term i.e. parishes created by an act of Parliament, are comparatively few in number.  Rathmolyon and Rathcore both happen to be civil, as well as religious parishes.  The civil authorities frequently adopted the Catholic parish structure as a convenient administrative unit and the Established Church generally adopted the traditional parish boundaries.  Various amalgamations of Catholic parishes took place for administrative reasons within the Church.  As a result of all these developments and amalgamations, Rathmolyon and Enfield form one unit for Roman Catholic purposes, Rathmolyon and Rathcore are aligned with Agher and Castlerickard to form a union of parishes for Church of Ireland purposes, hence historical data on Agher and Castlerickard has been included.