Sir Richard John Griffith (1784–1878)
About this Event
Tailte Éireann is delighted to organise a lecture on the life of the public servant Sir Richard Griffith to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the First Valuation Act in Ireland in 1826.
About:
In this talk, Patrick Wyse Jackson will consider the varied facets of Richard Griffith’s work and contributions as a scientist and public servant.
Richard Griffith who was born in Dublin, and trained in Edinburgh as a geologist, he returned to Ireland as a young man and took up positions as an engineer and surveyor with the Bog Commissioners from 1809 to 1813. He then served as the Mining Engineer to the Dublin Society from 1812 to 1829. From 1814 he began to assemble a geological map of Ireland and this was finally published in 1838 by the Railway Commissioners of whom he was one.
Griffith is today best remembered for his role as Commissioner of the General Survey and Valuation of Rateable Property from 1826 to 1868 which saw the publication of the Primary Valuation of Ireland between 1848 and 1864. He directed the
work of over 150 surveyors and provided them with detailed instructions as to how to conduct the surveys. Today ‘Griffith’s Valuation’ as it became to be known, is an invaluable resource for genealogists and all those interested in the social history of Ireland during the Victorian era.
Speaker Biography:
Patrick Wyse Jackson is Emeritus Professor in Geology and Fellow at Trinity College Dublin, and a Member of the Royal Irish Academy. He has published extensively on the lives and work of Irish geologists, including Richard Griffith of whom he recently highlighted a newly-discovered
photograph. Patrick is also fascinated by the links between geology and the built environment and is currently engaged in studies on the sources and utilisation of building and decorative stone in Ireland as part of the STONEBUILT Ireland project.
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
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