The most frequent family names with roots in County Antrim — names that spread through Ireland and the Irish diaspora:
County Antrim is the most north-easterly county in Ireland and the one with the strongest Ulster-Scots identity. The Plantation of Ulster in the early seventeenth century brought thousands of Scottish settlers — Presbyterians from the Scottish Lowlands and Borders — to Antrim and Down. Their descendants, the Scots-Irish (or Ulster-Scots), became one of the most significant immigrant groups in American history.
The Giant's Causeway — approximately 40,000 interlocking basalt columns formed by volcanic activity 50–60 million years ago — is Antrim's most iconic natural feature. The causeway was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. According to legend, it was built by the giant Finn McCool to walk to Scotland.
Belfast, though technically in County Antrim, is a separate county borough. The surrounding county includes the nine Glens of Antrim — a series of narrow valleys running from the plateau to the sea — which are among the most beautiful landscapes in Ireland and among the least changed by modern development.
The Scots-Irish from Antrim — Presbyterian farmers who emigrated in huge numbers in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries — settled the Appalachians, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. They were disproportionately represented in Washington's Continental Army and among the signatories of the Declaration of Independence. The American presidents Andrew Jackson and Woodrow Wilson both had Antrim County roots.
Love Ireland covers the Glens of Antrim, the Giant's Causeway, the Dark Hedges, and the Causeway Coastal Route. The county's landscape is extraordinary and its diaspora connections to America are among the strongest in Ireland.
Subscribe to Love Ireland — FreeIf your family came from County Antrim, here's where to start your research:
Common County Antrim surnames with dedicated pages on this site: