MARCUS DE BÚRCA:MARCUS DE BÚRCA, who has died aged 83, was a barrister, journalist and parliamentary draftsman. But history was his great passion, and it is as author of the first substantial history of the Gaelic Athletic Association that he will be best remembered.
His The GAA: A Historywas published in 1980, and immediately established itself as the definitive work. A second expanded edition, published in 2000, brought the story of the GAA to the end of the 20th century, covering the changes and challenges faced by the association in the 1980s and 1990s.
De Búrca wrote in the preface: “Like many hundreds of thousands of Irish men and women in the past century, I grew up in a home where Gaelic games were enthusiastically supported.
“However, apart from a brief period as an obscure player in my late teens, I have never been actively involved in GAA, and am not blind to its weaknesses and faults.”
The launch of the book in November 1980 was low-key, suggesting to some of those present that senior GAA figures were uneasy at the exposure of the association to the first full-length account of its activities.
Paddy Downey of this newspaper reported: “Successive speakers, all of them officials, past and present, of the GAA, seemed to distance themselves from the work. This, they implied, was not the official history of the association: it was one man’s view and interpretation, that of Marcus de Búrca.”
Welcoming the book, Seán Kilfeather, also of this newspaper, praised the “massive research” carried out by de Búrca. “In doing so, he has served the GAA well. What is more important, however, is that he has served Irish history well.”
In his review for the Tipperary Historical Journal, Liam Kelly noted that the book was well written, well researched and documented. "Some of the GAA's mistakes and embarrassments are included. This may not suit some people, who would wish to read a glowing eulogy without any hint of fault or mistake. But it's all the more realistic and truthful for that."
Marcus de Búrca came from a GAA background. His father Pádraig was for many years legal adviser to the association, and consequently an ex-officio member of the Central Council. His grandfather, John J Bourke of Tipperary town, known all over Munster as “Bourke the Handicapper”, was an official handicapper and judge at athletic meetings in the association’s early days.
Educated at Belvedere College, Dublin, de Búrca graduated in law and economics from UCD and the King's Inns. During the 1950s he worked as a journalist for the Irish Independent, while practising at the Bar. In 1960 he joined the staff of the attorney general's office, where he worked as a parliamentary draftsman. He retired in 1987.
He disliked legal jargon. Writing for The Irish Timesin 2001, he welcomed the Law Reform Commission's report Statutory Drafting and Interpretation: Plain Language and the Law, stating that it was of relevance to more than the "wig-and-gown brigade" and that a wide range of people had an interest in the implementation of its recommendations.
An early historical work was The O'Rahilly, published in 1967. This biography of the life of Michael Joseph Rahilly, a founder of the Irish Volunteers who died in the 1916 Rising, was praised by Seán Ó Lúing as a "competent and well-ordered study".
John O'Leary: A Study in Irish Separatismalso was published in 1967. In the late 1970s came the commission from the GAA to write the association's history. Other publications include a biography of GAA founder Michael Cusack, and a history of Faughs hurling club.
In Murder at Marlhill(1993), he set out to prove the innocence of Harry Gleeson, hanged following his conviction for the murder of Mary McCarthy in 1941.
A former president of the Tipperary Historical Society, he also edited the society’s journal and contributed to other similar publications.
A minute’s silence in his honour was observed at Semple Stadium, Thurles, prior to last week’s Tipperary-Kilkenny hurling match.
Predeceased by his wife Phyllis, he is survived by his sons Richard, Raymond and John.
Marcus de Búrca (Marcus Bourke): born 1927; died March 2nd, 2010