Galway is a city in the West of Ireland in the province of Connacht. Galway City Council is the local authority for the city. Galway lies on the River Corrib between Lough Corrib and Galway Bay and is surrounded by County Galway. It is the fourth most populous urban area in the Republic of Ireland and the sixth most populous city in the island of Ireland.
According to the 2016 Irish Census, Galway city has a population of 79,504; however, the rural county agglomeration is far bigger.
The city's name is from the Irish name for Abhainn na Gaillimhe ("Galway"), which formed the western boundary of the earliest settlement, Dún Bhun na Gaillimhe "Fort at the mouth of the Gaillimh". (Mythical and alternative derivations of the name are given in History of Galway).
Historically, the name was Anglicised as Galliv, which is closer to the Irish pronunciation as is the city's name in Latin, Galvia.
The city also bears the nickname "The City of the Tribes" (Irish: Cathair na dTreabh) because of the fourteen merchant families called the "tribes of Galway"[6] led the city in its Hiberno-Norman period. The term tribes was a derogatory one, because the merchants saw themselves as Anglo-Irish and were loyal to the King during the English Civil War. They later adopted the term as a badge of honour and pride in defiance of the town's Cromwellian occupier.
Residents of the city refer to themselves as "Galwegians".
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