Traveller marriage to a Gorger/Settled Person - Symbolic burial of a coffin?

[celtic liberty]

Hi,

I am looking for help with some customs of the Travelling Community in the 1870's in Ireland. I know it's a long way back.

I am wondering if a Traveller married a settled person and maybe chose to or was forced to give up the Traveller way of life -  Was there  such a custom as burying an empty coffin on it's head to symbolise the ending of the Traveller way of life?   This would have been back in the 1870's in Ireland.

I would really appreciate any help.

Thanks in advance.

Mary
Celtic Liberty

[panished]

helo Mary

 i have read many accounts of the past, i have never came across that story, if i find anything in the future i will write back. I just yesterday discovered one old story about burying Boots with the coffin of a Gipsy Man, and there was also a Gipsy word given that i never new, relating to the burriel of a Gipsy from the early 1870s, it is in the Bradford Daily Telegraph 26 December 1889, under the title "Dead Mens Shoes", it also tells of the history about throwing boots in the air at weddings, i wrote about that in a post a few weeks back regarding the wedding of  Goliah Heaps and  Matilda Elliott 25 April 1863, i never new the reason but through researching this article it gives an answer, i think you would like the article, there are story's in the newspapers of the Irish Travelers you speak of, from the 1800s, in England to, i come across them when i am researching about the Gipsies, i do not save them, so keep trying you never know what will turn up.

michael

[celtic liberty]

Michael,Thank you so much for taking the time and trouble to answer my query.

I will certainly look up the articles you have mentioned and your previous posts which I know will be very interesting.

Thank you again

Mary

Celtic Liberty

[panished]

 Mary, i did find an Irish Funeral with Customs, before 1870, and not in Ireland but England, they are called Gipsies, seems like all Travelling people were called Gipsies in the olden times, i know your question was slightly different, i think tho that it is good to get an all round feeling of the subject that you are trying to find.  Good Luck in your Research. 

Nottingham Review and General Advertiser for the Midland Counties
Friday 26 May 1848

A GYPSY FUNERAL-On Tuesday a large concourse of people asssembled at the cemetery, Uttoxeter Road, to witness the above somewhat novel sight. The Deceased was a Man 25 years old and belongs to a numerous  Irish tribe, who are located for the present near this Town, On Sunday and Monday the Body lay in state, and was visited by many parties; an " Irish Funeral Wake," being held by the gipsies over the body.
The funeral service was performed by the Rev. Mr. Daniels Roman Catholic Priest of Derby.

 

[celtic liberty]

Michael thank you again for your help which I really appreciate.

 
The burial customs for an Irish funeral can be novel at times!   If I do find the answer I'm looking for I will let you know.


Mary
Celtic Liberty

[panished]

Mary

would you be able to tell me if Mc dennis is a Irish Traveller name, i am trying to understand who is who, you can not just believe names, of course it sound to me that  John Mc Dennis is a Irish name, yet in 1859 there was a fight named riot and homicide, involving Swarthy Gipsies, in the end Mc Dennis one of the Gipsies was on the  Willful Murder Charge, this was in a little quiet town named Ludlow, Shropshire, its near the Welsh border, i have come across another report and the Gipsies are stated as "Irish Gipsies" this i think was in the 1830s, so then, in that time, they new them as Irish, i was just wondering if there were Gipsys from Europe who went to live in Ireland, or are they all what is known as the Irish Travellers.
 I know lots like Genealogy for it like a collecting game, thats fine, if you do not know just leave it at that.

Good Luck for the Future... Leahcim
 

[Barb007]

Hi Mary (Celtic Liberty) this is my first post on RootsChat. I realise you posted the above post in 2018 but this was the exact thing I was searching for last night. I have been trying to track down info about my gt grandmother. I was originally told by my aunt that she was Jewish and from Eastern Europe (she married my great grandfather in Tipperary). But after years of trying to substantiate this and no clues DNA wise either I started to think maybe that story was a cover story for something else. My hunch was that she may have been an Irish Traveller and that now looks likely with a new dna match. But my point is that my aunt told me that my gt grandmother had to bury an empty coffin in the ground on its end in order to signify giving up her Jewishness. It's such a specific thing. I did find one tiny reference to that in relation to that religion and culture but it was very vague. So I more recently wondered if it applied in the Travelling community too. So when I came across your question, my ears pricked up! I just wondered what made you ask that question in the first place and if since then you've found out any more connection of that custom to the Travelling community? If you can help with any ideas on other 'leads' or information about Travellers  particularly in Tipperary but in Ireland generally, that would be amazing. I suppose it's possible my gt grandmother may have been a Traveller from an Eastern European country. If you have any thoughts on that I'd be so grateful too. I did visit the area about 10 years ago and met a very elderly man who said he knew my gt grandparents when he was a child but he had never thought my gt grandmother would have been from a different country. Though why my gt grandmother, or my grandmother or my aunt would have devised the 'Eastern European Jewish' story is a mystery.If they were 'ashamed' of a Traveller connection (which seems terrible now but it's hard to put ourselves back in time to understand what it meant then) why wouldn't they just have said she was Irish rather than make up the other story? Unless there was something about how she looked that might have indicated a different culture. It is such a mystery! Personally, I just want to know more about her and would love it if she were from the Travelling community or Eastern Europe or Jewish or all three! Sorry to write so much! Thank you.