Author: John Breslin
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An Internet Geek’s Introductory Guide to Irish Genealogy
So you want to get started with building your Irish family tree? Here are some initial tips from someone who has recently used (mostly) online tools to link back five or six generations… Software Firstly, I’d recommend getting a desktop application for storing your findings! There are various mobile apps…
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The Irishwoman Who Drained the Marsh of Marseillette
Famed soldier in the United Irishmen Miles Byrne refers in his Memoirs to a tract of wetlands bought by a Mrs Doyle Lawless near Carcassonne. In fact, he alludes to a link between her and Napoleon, when he says: “We have no Bonaparte [there in Ireland] to encourage and protect…
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The Dillons in France
Part of the Irish Brigade, Dillon’s Regiment was brought from Ireland to France in 1690 by Count Arthur Dillon (1670-1733) during the Williamite War. However, the Dillons originally came from France: Henri de LĂ©on of Brittany arrived in Ireland some 500 years earlier with the Normans and Prince John. Dillon…
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An Irish Regiment in Carcassonne
Did you know that over 260 years ago, Caserne Laperrine, the large military barracks beside Les Jacobins and originally built from 1709 to 1735, was once host to a battalion of Irish soldiers, part of Dillon’s Regiment from 1763 to 1764? Amongst them were many famous officers in the regiment,…
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Linking Ireland and Carcassonne
Carcassonne has neolithic origins, but likely owes its original oppidum (town) name of Carsac (later Carcaso) to the Gauls, a Celtic people. The Irish journalist Seamus MacCall laments in a 1938 Irish Press article that “Carcassonne is still a Celtic city, and in Carcassonne is Tara, Cruachan, Cashel, and the…
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Astérix and the Historical Interpretation
Introduction The year is 50 BC. Gaul is entirely occupied by the Romans. Well not entirely! One small village of indomitable Gauls still holds out against the invaders. And life is not easy for the Roman legionaries who garrison the fortified camps of Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium… And especially…
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How Jean-Michel Jarre has reflected France and the world through his music over multiple generations
Who is JMJ? In 1948, French electronic musician Jean-Michel Jarre was born in Lyon. His mother, France Pejot, was a Lyonnaise resistance fighter and concentration camp survivor, and his father, Maurice Jarre, was a composer of film music (including the soundtracks to David Lean’s “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Doctor Zhivago”).…
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Professorships: Academic Trajectory and Tips for Applicants
In June 2019, I received informal word that I was to be promoted to a Personal Professorship in Electronic Engineering at the National University of Ireland Galway, with the formal letter coming in early July. The promotion process as a whole has become a lot more transparent in recent years,…
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TechInnovate’s 2018 in Review
It was another great year for TechInnovate at NUI Galway… Here is a review of our 2018 activities in the areas of entrepreneurship education and technology innovation! We kicked off our €1M STARTED Project in January to teach researchers how to create startups, funded by the European Commission’s Erasmus+ Knowledge Alliances programme.…
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Moving All Mail and Other Items from Outlook .PST Files/Subfolders to One .PST File/Folder
I found some useful code by Shirley Zhang from DataNumen recently in my quest to move all messages from multiple Outlook (Windows) .PST files, including all subfolders, into one folder in another open .PST file. Firstly, there’s this code to count all the messages in a .PST file, and secondly…
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