Toland : In and Out of Ireland

Toland : In and Out of Ireland is a book that chronicles the origins of one of Ireland's most noble families. Toland is one of the rarest Irish surnames — originating in a small rural area of County Donegal in the mid-1600s. Author James Toland, for the past 20 years, has studied the origins of the Toland family back to the 1st century and makes connections between the ancient tuaths, or tribes, and the current bearers of the name. The name, Toland, was actually mistranslated from the Irish language into English during the 17th century. The original Gaelic name, O’Tuathalain (the people mighty), was shortened by census-takers to O’Toolan, then to Toolan, and finally anglicized as Toland. The descendants of just a half-dozen Tolands, listed in 1659, eventually emigrated to Scotland, England, Canada, the United States and Australia in the 1700s and 1800s — and now number more than 250,000 worldwide. If your name is Toland, you'll want to learn more about your family name while enjoying short biographies of some Europe's and America's most famous Tolands — an Academy Award winner, a Pulitzer Prize winner, California's most famous pioneer physician, and others.