Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

How come some towns never had a Mayor?

Options
  • 09-04-2013 11:12pm
    #1
    upncmnhistori
    Registered Users Posts: 234 ✭✭


    How come some towns in Ireland's history never had a Mayor. Athenry never had a mayor. Is their a politcal reason why certain towns never had Mayor's in Ireland since the Norman Invasion.


Comments

  • Options
    #2
    Jo King
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 2,139 ✭✭✭Jo King


    upncmnhistori wrote: »
    How come some towns in Ireland's history never had a Mayor. Athenry never had a mayor. Is their a politcal reason why certain towns never had Mayor's in Ireland since the Norman Invasion.

    Did those towns have a Mayor before the Norman invasion?


  • Options
    #3
    Victor
    Registered Users Posts: 78,371 ✭✭✭✭Victor


    Until the Local Government Act 2001, only cities had mayors (Dublin, Cork and Belfast having Lord Mayors). Other councils had a chair, although usually referred to as cathaoirleach.


  • Options
    #4
    Rebelheart
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 3,077 ✭✭✭Rebelheart


    upncmnhistori wrote: »
    How come some towns in Ireland's history never had a Mayor. Athenry never had a mayor. Is their a politcal reason why certain towns never had Mayor's in Ireland since the Norman Invasion.

    In the middle ages, smaller towns had a variety of positions which were synonymous with 'mayor'. For instance, a town could have either a portreeve or a sovereign as its civic head. However, many of these were theoretical while others were part-time mostly honorific positions.

    Often a town didn't have a mayor because it was dominated by the local manorial lord who refused to cede power to a corporation. Also remember that what we know as "towns" in the middle ages were hugely rural entities, a point which is greatly overlooked. Colm Lennon's seminal Sixteenth-Century Ireland is one of the few books which highlights this point.


Advertisement