Laois should be renamed to Queen’s County

dublincc2

Portlaoise should also be renamed Maryborough.

This is not a troll attempt, I am being genuine about these suggestions. The Queen who formed this county was a Catholic and her husband was a Spanish Catholic King, Spain being an ally of Ireland at the time. The county and the county town are named after the Catholic Queen. So the basis for the county being renamed on grounds of religious difference disappears.

Because we have counties called Queen’s and King’s doesn’t mean anything in terms of our independence as a republic. There is a borough of New York you may have heard of. France and Germany have many areas named after monarchs. Get over it.

The last reason for this is because the renaming doesn’t make any historical sense. The ancient kingdom of Leix was only partially in the current county. The name ‘Portlaoise’ was made up from scratch. It’s also a cringe Gaelicisation, almost like the best we could do to promote the Irish language was rename a town and two counties as if that made any difference, instead of reforming the education system. Whenever I hear a foreigner pronounce Laois or Portlaoise I just want to die with the embarrassment.

Legally speaking, the county is still called Queen’s and the town Maryborough. This should be recognised in law.

Gaspode

No. Try politics forum.