Placenames Special: Ireland Abroad, Part 2

From the coral shores of the Pacific to the red dust of Queensland, this episode traces two places linked by memory — the Irish habit of naming new worlds after home.

We begin on New Ireland in Papua New Guinea — once called Latangai, later Nova Hibernia and Neumecklenburg. Beneath each name lies a story of power, endurance, and 30,000 years of unbroken tradition.

Then to Tyrconnell in Queensland — a Donegal name carried across oceans, first for a pastoral station, later a gold mine with Australia’s oldest working stamper battery.

Together, these stories reveal how Irish names travelled the world — comforting the displaced, yet erasing older voices. New Ireland and Tyrconnell are not just places, but echoes of empire, memory, and belonging.

Join Liam Blake for a journey across continents, languages, and centuries — a reflection on how names remember, how they wound, and how, sometimes, they outlive the people who gave them.