Before the GAA: The state of Gaelic games before 1884

[diy01]

I've been thinking about buying The Gaelic Athletic Association, 1884-2009 by Mike Cronin. Have your read it?

What sort of state were 'gaelic games' in before the GAA was founded? I know there were various kinds of football games in different parts of the country. There were no standardised rules yet though. I've come across bits and pieces about the subject. Everything from snippets in travel guides to magazines. Claims that hurling had almost died out in most of Ireland until Cusack and co founded Cumann Lúthchleas Gael.

Was hurling (in whatever form) restricted to just a few counties? Was it the same with gaelic football?

[JCSkinner]

Read 'The Ball Is Round' by David Goldblatt.
There's a good potted history in there detailing how gaelic football was entirely fabricated and given a spoof back story in order to stymie the development of soccer, and to a lesser extent rugby, in Ireland.
Hurling, of course, goes back a very long way.

[TimBuckII]

I'm not sure but I think a big part of the Irish sport at the time was common athletics such as running and cycling. These came under the controll of the GAA in 1884 too.

[femmefatale]

Read 'The Ball Is Round' by David Goldblatt.
There's a good potted history in there detailing how gaelic football was entirely fabricated and given a spoof back story in order to stymie the development of soccer, and to a lesser extent rugby, in Ireland.
Hurling, of course, goes back a very long way.

Anyone who wants to know what this poster thinks of the GAA should take a look at his blog. There is a very unsavory poem with multiple insulting and denigrating references to GAA fans.

[Eldritch]

There's a good potted history in there detailing how gaelic football was entirely fabricated and given a spoof back story in order to stymie the development of soccer, and to a lesser extent rugby, in Ireland.

Oh reallllly? Then why do records of it date back further than 1527?

[Thoreau]

What sort of state were 'gaelic games' in before the GAA was founded?

The definitive studies on the subject are:
Liam P. Ó Caithnia, Scéal na hIomána (Dublin 1980) for hurling and Liam P. Ó Caithnia, Báirí Cos in Éirinn (Dublin 1984) for football.

In relation to the origins of football in Ireland, he writes as follows (1984: 24):

Ansin i 1698 nó 1699 tháinig John Dunton go hÉirinn. Cuairteoir ó Shasana ab ea é seo, díoltóir leabhar agus scríbhneoir ar a sheal agus d'fhág sé againn ********************as (c. 300 focal) ar iomáint na hÉireann agus tagairt ar éigean (faoi bhun 30 focal) do bháirí cos. Thuill sé clú as tuairisc na hiomána ach ní raibh le rá faoi bháirí cos aige ach: "They do not play often at football only in a small territory called Fingal near Dublin the people use it much, and trip, and shoulder very handsomely." Bheinn féin sásta gurbh é seo chéadtosach na mbáirí cos in Éirinn agus is fiú a rá, nach mór ceithre scór bliain ina dhiaidhsean, nuair a scríobh an Francach, Coquebert de Montbret, a thuairisc ar bháirí iomána in Éirinn nach raibh de cheiliúir ar chosbháirí aige ach aon abairt amháin: "Cosbháirí atá i gCúige Laighean acu". Fós féin nó raibh leathnú ar chluiche na gcos!

I see that this preposterous forum software objects to Liam Ó Caithnia's use of the word c-u-n-t-a-s for some reason I can't fathom.

[JCSkinner]

Oh reallllly? Then why do records of it date back further than 1527?

Records of ball games date back further than that in Ireland.
But they weren't gaelic football.
Every village had virtually its own rules for football up until the 19th century, when they began to codify - firstly into games where the ball was carried or not, and secondly into whether the ball should be round or oval.
Early codifications include what we know today as rugby, and slightly later, soccer. Pretty much every other football code is a result of a historical variant on these. American football, for example, arose largely because Harvard didn't like the rules of rugby, so they created their own variant.
English public schools played a huge role. Rugby is named after the school, and Eton still plays not one but two football codes unique to the school.
In this context, in Ireland, the variant that took off in the mid to late 19th century was soccer. As clubs sprouted up all over the place, the nascent GAA was quite rightly concerned for the future of the hurling tradition.
For this reason, they sought to codify their own football variant, which it must be said is a very exciting and successful format, being faster and higher scoring that a lot of other football codes.
It's a great game, but there is no direct lineage to the village football games of the middle ages. It was created to combat the rise of soccer in Ireland, and is as much a product of that antipathy as rule 42 was.