Kildare Genealogy Tours
My Ireland Heritage find your Ancestors and exact house location from the 1700’s to the late 1800’s, and all available records in Ireland. We are an Irish family business dedicated to assisting you in your Irish Genealogy research for your roots and records of your family history of past generations in Kildare, as well as providing you with a once in a lifetime Irish Genealogy tour experience to visit your families original family house and Walk in the Footsteps of your Irish Ancestors.
Sean and the Team at My Ireland Heritage are a Government certified & approved Genealogy & Touring Company, and will personally guide you on the journey into your Irish ancestry to any County in Ireland.
Many companies are genealogy research only, many companies are touring companies only, we at My Ireland Family Heritage are proud to be able to encompass your research and tour together enabling us to work with you throughout the process to customize your tour with you and for you. To achieve a full genealogy tour experience consider adding one of our one-day historical tours.
Our Tours
Our Ancestral Townland Experience Tours
County Kildare’s flat, fertile plains, including the wide open expanse of the Curragh, made it prime agricultural land and gave rise to Ireland’s horse-breeding tradition, still centred in Kildare today. For genealogy research, this generally means better-preserved farming and estate records than in some of Ireland’s more remote counties, since Kildare’s larger landholdings often kept detailed rent rolls and tenant lists alongside standard parish registers.
Kildare sits close to Dublin, and its population moved between the two more freely than in many other counties, so it’s not unusual to find a family recorded in Kildare parish registers for one generation and Dublin city directories for the next. We work through both sets of records where relevant, always aiming to establish the actual townland and church connected to your family rather than stopping at a civil parish name. Estate records tied to Kildare’s larger landholdings can also add valuable detail that simply doesn’t survive in every county.
A Kildare tour can take in the open plains of the Curragh and the county’s market towns before arriving at your family’s specific townland, giving you both a sense of the wider landscape and the precise, personal location your ancestors called home.
- Kildare has 14 Baronies
- Kildare has 113 Civil Parishes
- Kildare has 89 Electoral Divisions
- Kildare has 1210 Townlands
- Kildare has 66 Sub Townlands
Rich in heritage and history, Kildare Town dates from the 5th Century, when it was the site of the original ‘Church of the Oak’ and monastery founded by Saint Brigid. This became one of the three most important Christian foundations in Celtic Ireland. It was said that Brigid’s mother was a Christian and that Brigid was reared in her father’s family that is with the children of his lawful wife. From her mother, Brigid learned dairying and the care of the cattle, and these were her occupations after she made a vow to live a life of holy chastity.
Both Saint Mel of Ardagh and Bishop Mac Caille have been credited with the consecration of Brigid after which the woman established a community beneath an oak tree, on a hill on the edge of the Curragh. Hence the name Cill Dara, the church of the oak.
Kildare was shired in 1297 and assumed its present borders in 1832, following amendments to remove a number of enclaves.
The county was the home of the powerful Fitzgerald family. Parts of the county were also part of the Pale area around Dublin
Family Dynasties 1500-1600 AD
- Irish – O’Connor, Kelly
- Norman – Eustace, Fitzgerald, De Clare, De Vessey, talbot
- Scottish – None
- Viking – None
County Kildare – Things to do and may be possible to include within your Ancestral Townland Experience Tour
- Irelands Ancient East
- Irish National Stud & Gardens
- Newbridge Silverware Visitor Center
- Kildare Village
- Castletown House
- St. Patrick’s College (Maynooth)
- Saint Brigid’s Cathedral and Round Tower (Kildare)
- Mondello Park International Motor Racing Circuit
- Donadea Forest Park
- The Curragh Racecourse
- Maynooth Castle
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Kildare have better surviving records than more remote counties?
Often, yes. Its larger estates and closer connection to Dublin mean additional record sets, like rent rolls, sometimes survive alongside standard parish registers.
My family moved between Kildare and Dublin, can you trace both?
Yes, this pattern is common, and we’re experienced in following a family across both counties’ record sets.
Is the Curragh connected to genealogy research, or just horse racing?
The Curragh is best known for horse breeding and racing today, but the surrounding plains were also farmed by generations of Kildare families, and we can include this landscape in your tour where relevant.
