Photo Credit: long may she rain via Compfight
History of Greystones
Long ago no one lived in Greystones.
It was too wild and wind swept.
But people lived at Rathdown.
There is evidence that people have lived there
from the time of the Stone Age.
Then King Heremon built a rath
Photo Credit: mollydot via Compfight
in a more sheltered spot to the north of Greystones.
This was at Rathdown.
This was 500 BC.
Early farmers lived at Rathdown too
By the Middle Ages there were 500 people living at Rathdown.
Joachim S. Müller via Compfight
The Vikings came by boat and by land from Dublin.
Photo Credit: Arild Nybø via Compfight
Greystones is in County Wicklow.
Wicklow means ‘Viking Meadow’.
Vikings were fierce warriors from the North of Europe.
Later the Normans lived at the castle.
They were skilled soldiers from the North of France.
Photo Credit: Matthijs via Compfight
In 1301, the wild, Wicklow tribes,
the O’Tooles and the O’Byrnes burnt down the castle.
They came on foot and horseback.
In 1800 no one was living at Greystones.
Described as a ‘wild headland’,
English speaking sailors
sailing on the Irish Sea
used call the area ‘the grey stones’
because of the grey rocks.
In 1825, there were 7 fishing families living there.
The arrival of the railway changed all that.
The family of the former President of Ireland,
Éamonn de Valera lived in the Burnaby from 1916-1922.
Some of his children attended our school.
Michael Collins used visit Greystones too.
We have done some project work for
the La Touche Legacy Conference 2017.
You can read about our work HERE.
Now we are a town in the ‘commuter belt’.
People live in Greystones
and commute by train to Dublin city to work.
Lots of tourists come and visit us on the train.
It is a good place to visit and a GREAT place to live.
