What’s in a name?
It appears certain now that the Freemans of Aghamore and Tibohine weren’t always called that! The given derivation of the Seery surname according to the ‘Dictionary of American Family Names’ (2nd edition, 2022) is:
Seery - Irish (Westmeath): shortened Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Saoraidhe ‘descendant of Saoraidhe’ a personal name derived from Gaelic saordha ‘noble, generous.’ It has been Anglicized (translated) as Freeman. Some authorities however believe that the original Irish form was Ó Síoghraidh from the Scandinavian personal name Sigefrith.
The change from Seery to Freeman can be witnessed in the early Tibohine Parish Registers around the 1820s. There are 6 families who are seen using a combination of Seery/Freeman surnames interchangeably in their children’s baptismal entries. This lasts until about the 1850s when most Seery’s have adopted the Freeman surname. One exception is a Freeman family from Cloonbunny who changed from Freeman to Seery in the 1890s probably as part of the Gaelic language revival of the time.
Unfortunately, this change cannot be seen in the Aghamore records, as they only started in 1864, which was after the change would have occurred. Fortunately, though, there does exist a diocesan copy of the Aghamore marriages that took place from 1822-27. It is interesting to note that no Freeman marriages are recorded for this time period as either participants or witnesses. During this same period however, 5 Seery marriages and 17 Seery witnesses are recorded, the implication being that the Seery/Freeman change was happening there as well.
It appears therefore that the Connaught Freemans originally had the Gaelic name Ó Saoraidhe or, Ó Síoghraidh which was then Anglicised to Seery based on its sound, before finally being translated into English as Freeman.
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