County town

A county town is the 'capital' or main town of a county. County towns are usually the location of administrative or judicial functions, or established over time as the de facto main town of a county. The concept of a county town eventually became detached from its original meaning of where the county administration is based (see County halls below).

List of county towns within Ireland

Historic counties of Northern Ireland

County	County town
County Antrim	Antrim
County Armagh	Armagh
County Down	Downpatrick
County Fermanagh	Enniskillen
County Londonderry	Derry
County Tyrone	Omagh

Note - Despite the fact that Belfast is the capital of Northern Ireland, it is not the county town of any county. Greater Belfast straddles two counties (Antrim and Down).

Republic of Ireland

Traditional counties of Ireland

The term county capital is also used.

County	County town
County Carlow	Carlow
County Cavan	Cavan
County Clare	Ennis
County Cork	Cork
County Donegal	Lifford
County Dublin	Dublin
County Galway	Galway
County Kerry	Tralee
County Kildare	Naas
County Kilkenny	Kilkenny
County Laois (formerly Queen's County)	Portlaoise (formerly known as Maryborough)
County Leitrim	Carrick-on-Shannon
County Limerick	Limerick
County Longford	Longford
County Louth	Dundalk
County Mayo	Castlebar
County Meath	Trim (Navan - de facto)
County Monaghan	Monaghan
County Offaly (formerly King's County)	Tullamore (since 1835), originally Philipstown
County Roscommon	Roscommon
County Sligo	Sligo
County Tipperary	Previously Cashel and Clonmel. Since 1898 shared between Clonmel (south) and Nenagh (north). Tipperary Town has never been county town.
County Waterford	Dungarvan (previously Waterford).
County Westmeath	Mullingar
County Wexford	Wexford
County Wicklow	Wicklow

Other counties of Ireland

County	County town
Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown	Dún Laoghaire
Fingal	Swords
North Tipperary	Nenagh
South Dublin	Tallaght
South Tipperary	Clonmel