Forty Foot

The Forty Foot () is a promontory on the southern tip of Dublin Bay at Sandycove, County Dublin, Ireland, from which people have been swimming in the Irish Sea all year round for some 250 years.

Name

The name "Forty Foot" is somewhat obscure. On an 1833 map, the Marine Road (located 1.5 km to the west) was named the Forty Foot Road, possibly because it was 40 ft wide; the name may have been transferred to the swimming place, which was called the Forty-Foot Hole in the 19th century.

Other accounts claim the name was given by fishermen because it was forty feet ( fathoms) deep, but the water in the area is no deeper than 20 ft. Others have attempted to link it to the 40th (the 2nd Somersetshire) Regiment of Foot, who supposedly bathed there, but they were stationed at Richmond Barracks in Inchicore.

Use

At first, it was exclusively a male bathing place, and Sandycove Bathers Association, a men's swimming club, was established. Owing to its relative isolation and gender-restrictions it became a popular spot for nudists. On 24 July 1974, about a dozen female equal-rights activists ("Dublin City Women’s Invasion Force") went swimming, and sat with placards.

Later, a few women swam nude in 1989. Now swimming is open to men, women, and children. In 2014, the Sandycove Bathers Association ended the ban on women club members, and they may now use the onsite changing rooms and clubhouse kitchen. The swimming club requests voluntary contributions for the upkeep of the area.

Safety

Death, near-drowning and hypothermia have resulted from swimming at Forty Foot.

In literature

James Joyce and Oliver St. John Gogarty once resided at the Martello tower together. It is now the James Joyce Tower and Museum. The opening section of Joyce's Ulysses is set here, with the characters Stephen Dedalus and Buck Mulligan being partly based on Joyce himself and Gogarty, respectively. Buck Mulligan described the sea as "The snotgreen sea. The scrotumtightening sea."

The Forty Foot also featured in the novels At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O'Brien (1939), At Swim, Two Boys by Jamie O'Neill (2001), Nessuna notizia dello scrittore scomparso by Daniele Bresciani (2017),The Elements by John Boyne (2025), and Again Rachel by Marian Keyes (2022).

In media

The Forty Foot is featured in the series Bad Sisters.

In the 2023 documentary film Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, With Dave Letterman, David Letterman visits the location, which ends up serving as inspiration for the composition of a song by Bono and the Edge called "40 Foot Man" featured in the credits of the show.

Images

File:Forty foot pic.jpg|Forty Foot changing rooms and clubhouse kitchen, 2008 File:Sunrise In Sandycove Dublin Ireland (97559339).jpeg|Sunrise at the Forty Foot, 2015 File:Sunrise In Sandycove Dublin Ireland (97656477).jpeg|Sunrise at the Forty Foot, 2015

References

References

1. "Cladach an Daichead Troigh/Forty Foot".
2. as of 2008
3. (December 23, 1988). "Ulysses Annotated: Notes for James Joyce's Ulysses". University of California Press.
4. (December 23, 1899). "Country Life Illustrated". Hudson & Kearns.
5. "The Forty Foot Dun Laoghaire - J D Wetherspoon".
6. Di, Jin. (June 3, 2014). "Literary Translation: Quest for Artistic Integrity". Routledge.
7. McLoughlin, Darren. "Swimming at Dublin's Forty Foot".
8. "Famous Baths".
9. Hendroff, Adrian. (May 31, 2017). "Family Walks Around Dublin". Gill & Macmillan Ltd.
10. (July 1989). "Nude Bathing At The Forty Foot".
11. (7 January 2016). "Freezing at the Forty Foot".
12. (29 September 2019). "Man, 50s, dies after getting into difficulty at Dublin's Forty Foot". [[Irish Examiner]].
13. (2018-03-02). "Woman pulled from the sea at Dublin's Forty Foot during storm today". Her.ie.
14. (22 April 2022). "Brave lifeguards rescue injured swimmer at Forty Foot beach". DublinLive.
15. (March 31, 2021). "Exhausted swimmer rescued clinging to rocks near Dublin's Forty Foot". TheJournal.ie.
16. (August 11, 2021). "Is that Sharon Horgan in the Forty Foot? ‘Swim to her!’".
17. (March 17, 2023). "Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, with Dave Letterman". Disney+.