River Vartry in Wicklow - aerial - 2025-03-09 01

The River Vartry (; ) is a river in

County Wicklow County Wicklow ( ; ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. The last of the traditional 32 counties, having been formed as late as 1606 in Ireland, 1606, it is part of the Eastern and Midland Region and the Provinces ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

, and an important water source for the city of

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

.Dublin on a knife-edge when it comes to water supply
''Irish Times'' March 10, 2018

Name

The river first appears in 12th-century records with the name ''Fertir'' or ''Fortir''. This is believed to derive from an

Old Irish Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic (, Ogham, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ; ; or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic languages, Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive written texts. It was used from 600 to 900. The ...

term meaning "fortress", perhaps referring to a ringfort at Glasnamullen. Similar placenames are found at Forther, Forthar,

Fortriu Fortriu (; ; ; ) was a Pictish kingdom recorded between the 4th and 10th centuries. It was traditionally believed to be located in and around Strathearn in central Scotland, but is more likely to have been based in the north, in the Moray and ...

and Ferter in Scotland.

Course

The Vartry rises in ''Calary Bog'' under the Great Sugar Loaf mountain in northern

. Passing through a Dublin municipal reservoir complex, it flows east towards Ashford under Annagolan Bridge, and down through Devil's Glen. From there it passes the Nun's Cross Bridge (dating from the 18th century) on through Ashford, under the N11 road and continues eastwards into Broad Lough, which flows towards Wicklow town. Broad Lough is a narrow lake which lies approximately 1 km north of Parnell Bridge in

Wicklow Wicklow ( ; , meaning 'church of the toothless one'; ) is the county town of County Wicklow in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is located on the east of Ireland, south of Dublin. According to the 2022 census of Ireland, 2022 census, it had ...

town (at its closest point) and approximately 4 km north of Parnell Bridge (at its furthest point). This lake and surrounding wetlands evolved when a sand spit formed along the coastline cutting off the Vartry from its original egress. This sand spit is called The Murrough/Murragh and it carries the Dublin to Wicklow coastal railway line built in the 1860s. Broad Lough drains southwards into the

Irish Sea The Irish Sea is a body of water that separates the islands of Ireland and Great Britain. It is linked to the Celtic Sea in the south by St George's Channel and to the Inner Seas off the West Coast of Scotland in the north by the North Ch ...

through Wicklow town centre and harbour. The name of this stretch of water (approximately 1.5 km in length) is disputed. It is variously called the River Leitrim, the Broad Lough Estuary and the River Vartry.

Historical references

According to ''The Life of St. Patrick and His Place in History'' the place where St. Patrick landed was at Inverdea, the mouth of the river Vartry in County Wicklow.

City water supply

In 1861 Parliament passed the Dublin Waterworks Act creating a project to dam the River Vartry in Roundwood to form the

Vartry Reservoir Vartry Reservoir () is a reservoir at Roundwood in County Wicklow, Republic of Ireland, Ireland. The water is piped from Vartry to a large open service reservoir in Stillorgan in the southern suburbs of Dublin. The reservoir is operated by Iris ...

. The dam, accompanying waterworks, and a pipe tunnel through a part of the Wicklow Mountains, were completed in 1865, providing the first clean mass source of water for

, replacing water obtained from the canals. The Vartry Reservoir and Waterworks still supply some 200,000 homes, providing 40% of all of Dublin's water needs.

Popular culture

There are several references to the Vartry in

James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (born James Augusta Joyce; 2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influentia ...

's '' Ulysses'', "... and on his expressed desire for some beverage to drink Mr Bloom in view of the hour it was and there being no pump of Vartry water available for their ablutions let alone drinking purposes..." or "Power. Particular about his drink. Flaw in the glass, fresh Vartry water." Likewise, in ''

Finnegans Wake ''Finnegans Wake'' is a novel by Irish literature, Irish writer James Joyce. It was published in instalments starting in 1924, under the title "fragments from ''Work in Progress''". The final title was only revealed when the book was publishe ...

'', Joyce refers to the reservoir, writing "Water, water, darty water!"McHugh, Ronald. Annotations to Finnegans Wake. p. 521

References