A QUESTION OF ATTRIBUTION by Donal Kennedy

Under the heading “Burke, Edmund (1729-97)” the Oxford Illustrated Dictionary says – “English Whig statesman,political and philosophical writer, and orator.”

This comes as something of a shock to me.My late mother used  point with pride to the statue of Edmund Burke outside Dublin’s Trinity College, for he was not only our compatriot but kinsman, as her maiden name was Burke. The de Burgos had arived in Ireland with the first wave of Normans in the 12th Century and were soon described as “ipsis Hiberniores Hiberniis” – more Irish than the Irish themselves, and remained assimilated. Edmund Burke was educated first in County Cork, probably in a “hedge school” and was almost certrainly fluent in Irish and was a graduate of Trinity College.

I then checked the same dictionary for “Sheridan, Richard Brinsley (1751-1815)” and found “Irish playwright and member of Parliament, author of ‘The Rivals’, ‘The School for Scandal’, etc.. Fair enough but Sheridan left Dublin aged 11, went to Harrow School, and never set foot in Ireland again.

I went back to Burke and found “Burke,William (1792-1829) Irishman who was executed in Edinburgh for smothering friendless people in order to sell their bodies for dissection to Edinburgh School of anatomy.”

Then I found the verrb “to burke” which means to smother. And then in Wikipedia I found that Gerry Adams is profiled. It describes his nationality as British.