1. Legend

2. Name

3. Historicity

4. Culture

5. References
    Sources  Citations 

Sheila NaGeira, Sheila Mageila, Sheila Na Geira Pike, or Princess Sheila is a legendary 17th-century Irish noblewoman regarded in Carbonear, Newfoundland as an ancestor of the locally prominent Pike family.

Legend

The family legend first appeared in print in a 1934 article on Harbour Grace by William A. Munn.^[1] It states that Sheila lived in the early 17th century and was from the recently dispossessed Gaelic nobility in Connacht.^[1] Catholic education being illegal in Ireland, she was sent to France to a convent school where her aunt was abbess.^[1] On the voyage there or back her ship was captured, first by a Dutch warship, and then by an English privateer captained by Peter Easton on its way to Newfoundland.^[1] En route Easton's lieutenant Gilbert Pike and Sheila fell in love; they landed at Harbour Grace, were married by the ship's chaplain, and settled first in Mosquito (now Bristol's Hope) and later in Carbonear.^[1]

Munn's 1934 version states that Sheila and Gilbert's firstborn was "the first white child in Newfoundland",^[1] predating John Guy's 1610 colony at Cupids.^[7] Other versions reduce the scope to first white child in Carbonear or the west coast of Newfoundland, or extend it to all of Canada or British North America (where Virginia Dare was reputedly born in Roanoke Colony in 1587).^[7] In the 1940s, the story was broadcast several times on VONF and included in a school reader, spreading it throughout Newfoundland.^[2] In 1958, P. J. Wakeham self-published Princess Sheila, a novel based on the legend which sold 5,000 copies by 1960 and was republished in 1987 as The Legend of Princess Sheila.^[3] Many post-1960 versions of the legend incorporate elements of Wakehams' novel, such as Sheila's death aged 105.^[4]

The Pikes became a large family in Newfoundland, and many with a Pike in their family tree claim descent from Sheila.^[5] Linda Duncan, MP for Edmonton—Strathcona, said in the Canadian House of Commons in 2009:^[6]

My family's roots, beginning around 1610 in Mosquito Point and Carbonear, were based on the shipping industry. My ancestor, Gilbert Pike, was a buccaneer. ... The most famous person in Newfoundland, Sheila NaGeira, is my ancestor.

Name

The given name Sheila is an anglicised spelling of the Irish name {{lang|ga|Síle}} (old spelling {{lang|ga|Sighile}}), itself originally a Gaelicisation of Celia or Cecilia which was later often equated with Julia. Sheila's second name is spelled Nagira in Munn's account.^[7] A baby girl in Carbonear was given the middle name Mageila in 1917 in honour of Sheila.^[8] All combinations of M or N with l or r are attested, while the middle vowel may be written i, e, a, ee, ei, or ie; together with the following r it may be pronounced {{IPA|/ɛr/}}, {{IPA|/ɛər/}}, {{IPA|/ɪər/}}, or {{IPA|/ɑr/}} (respectively like ERRor, squARE, nEAR, or stARt).^[9] Two-word forms like "NaGeira" and "na Geira" are found.^[10]

"Sighile Ni Ghadharadh", written by Munster poet Tadhg Gaelach Ó Súilleabháin in the 18th century, is an aisling poem in which the titular Sighile is a personification of Ireland, in bondage awaiting a Jacobite rising. James Clarence Mangan's English translation was published in 1849.^[11] "Sheela na Guira", "Celia O'Gara", "Shillinaguira", and many other spellings, is a well-known Irish jig setting of the poem, attested from 1745.^[12] "Ni Ghadharadh" (modern spelling {{lang|ga|Ní Ghadhra}}) is the feminine form of Ó Gadhra (O'Gara), surname of the chiefs of Luighne Connacht.^[13] Another legendary "Sheela-na-Guira", or "Gillian Dwyer", was a tyrannical O'Dwyer ({{lang|ga|Ní Dhuibhir}}) from Cullahill near Borrisoleigh in Munster.^[14] Na Guira has also been interpreted as Maguire ({{lang|ga|Nic Uidhir}}, an Ulster name).^[15] In Maria Edgeworth's 1817 play The Rose, Thistle, and Shamrock, the English Miss Gallagher scolds Irish maid Biddy for combing her hair too roughly: "You ran it fairly into my brain, you did! you're the grossest! heavy handiest!—fit only to wait on Sheelah na Ghirah, or the like." Biddy is insulted, "though I don't rightly know who that Sheelah na Ghirah was, from Adam."^[16] Ethna Carbery's poem "Shiela ní Gara" depicts another Jacobite personification of Ireland.^[17]

In 1978 Harold Horwood suggested that that "Na-gaira" was not a surname but an Irish-language epithet meaning "the beautiful", and that Sheila's true surname was O'Conor, that of the Gaelic kings of Connacht.^[18] Hiscock suggests Horwood's "Na-gaira" is a misreading of {{lang|ga|mo ghile}} "my darling".^[19] A related elaboration of the legend is that Sheila's true name and lineage were kept secret in Newfoundland to avoid persecution.^[20]

Historicity

Scholars are sceptical of the story.^[21] Elements are common to folk traditions elsewhere in North America.^[22] From the 1960s, older locals recounted to folklorists versions heard in their youth in the early twentieth century; there is no evidence of earlier currency.^[23] An 1892 letter on "Sheela-na-Guira" in an Irish journal describes her as "daughter of the head of the Connaught O'Garas, and a celebrated beauty", without reference to Newfoundland or Pike.^[13] The first Pike recorded in Newfoundland is Thomas Pike at Carbonear in 1681.^[24] Ron Howell, chairman of the Carbonear Heritage Society, has written,^[25] "This lore of Sheila and Gilbert has no basis in recorded fact. ... It would give me great pleasure to know that someone discovered a credible, recorded, 17th or 18th century reference to either Sheila or Gilbert. I would suggest that anyone promoting the Sheila story note that it is folklore and not recorded history."

The putative grave of Sheila and Gilbert is on a site owned by the Pike family and descendants until acquired in the 1980s by the Royal Canadian Legion.^[26] In 1982 the Canadian Conservation Institute gave the faded inscription on the extant gravestone as follows:^[27]

Here lieth the body of John Pike, Sen. who departed this life July 14, 1753, aged 63. Also Julian his wife, died June 14, 174[?] Aged 69.

Culture

Princess Sheila appears, crowned, on the coat of arms of the town of Carbonear.^[28] The local theatre is the "Princess Sheila NaGeira Theatre".^[29] A tourist information notice is at the site her putative grave.^[30] Besides Wakeham's novel, works based on the story include the 1955 poem "The Ballad of Sheila Na Geira" by L. E. F. English;^[30] the musicals Sheila Na Geira: A Legend of Love and Larceny (1997) by Chuck Herriott,^[40] and The Princess & the Pirate (1998) by Gordon Carruth;^[31] and the children's book A Newfoundland Adventure by Dawn Baker.^[25]

References

Sources

• {{cite book |last1=Fleischman |first1=Aloys |title=Sources of Irish Traditional Music c. 1600-1855 |date=5 Dec 2016 |orig-year=1998 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781135810252 |url=https://books.google.ie/books?id=s9SoDQAAQBAJ |accessdate=19 March 2019 }}
• {{cite journal |first=Philip |last=Hiscock |journal=Newfoundland Studies |volume=18 |number=2 |date=Fall 2002 |title=A Perfect Princess: The Twentieth-Century Legend of Sheila NaGeira and Gilbert Pike |url=https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/nflds/article/view/880/1233 |pages=195-244 |accessdate=19 January 2019}}

Citations

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