who had the authority to write, while excluding those who were defeated. Owen Owen is "by far the most complex character onstage", embodying 'all the conflicts and tensions in the play'. Owen arrives as an interpreter for the English in the Irish village, establishing himself as a pivotal cog in the social fabric of Baile Beag. He is comfortable being called interchangeably as Owen by the locals and Roland by the British, yet denies his heritage - "my job is to translate the quaint, archaic tongue you people persist in speaking into the King's good English". While claiming to be the "same me"; he is not - he is one part Irish and one part British, and acts as a crucial go-between, a role which he also denies, leading him to be less concerned with the social repercussions of his work. In the play, he is responsible for bringing together Maire and Yolland, but refuses to take responsibility for the effects of his actions; without Owen to fill the gap at the center, the union is doomed - just like Baile Beag and the English force. Owen's role in the destruction of Baile Beag is alluded to by Hugh's drunken recitation of the Aeneid near the end of the play. The lines refer to Carthage, the legendary North African settlement of Dido, and, in history, the notorious thorn in ancient Rome's side that was finally sacked and conquered in the Third Punic War - by analogy the Romans are the British and the Carthaginians the Irish. Historical references The Englishmen in the play are a detachment of the Royal Engineers and function as part of the Ordnance Survey creating six inch maps of Ireland. The characters of Captain Lancey and Lieutenant Yolland are fictionalised representations of two real soldiers who took part in the survey: Thomas Frederick Colby and William Yolland, but Thomas Larcom has also been identified as a possible model for the lieutenant, with Owen based on his teacher, the Irish linguist John O'Donovan. The character Máire contemplates emigration to America, reflecting the mass emigration of Irish people to America in the 19th century. The theme of emigration is key throughout the whole play, as Manus plans to leave after being offered a job in another hedge school. There are fearful references to potato blight, anticipating the Great Famine of 1845–49 (the play is set in 1833). Irish