Why do they Call it "Corned" Beef?

The term “Corned” comes from putting meat in a large crock and covering
it with large rock-salt kernels of salt that were refered to as “corns of salt”
This preserved the meat. The term Corned has been in the Oxford English Dictionary
as early as 888 AD.

Irish Were the First Exporters of Corned Beef
Irish were the biggest exporters of Corned Beef till 1825.
The English were serving corned beef but also the Irish. In this day and age
corned beef and cabbage is not very Irish, but corned beef is. The area of Cork, Ireland was a great producer of Corned Beef in the 1600’s until 1825. It was their chief export and sent all over the world, mostly in cans. The British army sustained on cans of Cork’s corned beef during the Napoleonic wars.

Before Corned Beef there was Salted Beef
The practice of salting meat goes back probably to ancient times in cold areas when they found that meat didn't spoil if it made contact with enough salt.

What a conveinience for nomads or soldieres, who were constantly traveling on horse or foot.

Origin of the Word "Corned"
The term Corned is modified from an Old Germanic (P.Gmc) Word Kurnam which meant small seed of anything. Since a kernel of rock salt look like a wheat or oat kernel size it became known as a corn of salt.
Even the word Kernel comes from this word Kurnam. or Kurnilo which meant the root of the seed.

The First Mention of “Corned Beef” goes back to an English Book by Richard Burton in 1621, Anatomy of Melancholy...Beef ..corned young of an ox.   Corned Beef and Cabbage is basically an American tradition on St. Patrick's Day started by irish-Americans in the mid 1800's   Some Irish people feel that corned beef and cabbage is about as Irish as spaghetti and meatballs.

Pork over Beef In Ireland

Since cows were used for milk rather than meat in poor times in Ireland, beef was a delicacy that was fed to kings. It was more common to celebrate a holiday meal with what they call a ham (Gammon) or bacon joint. ( a cured but unsmoked piece of pork) with their cabbage and potatoes. When many Irish Immigrants came over in the mid 1800’s they couldn’t find a bacon joint like they had in Ireland, so they found that Jewish corned beef was very similar in texture, and they used that for their holiday celebrations.

For an Irish Celebration use
a Bacon Joint

An Irish Bacon Joint, available here Irish Grub Corned Beef, A Rite of Spring Some say that Corned beef was a great Spring celebration meal because often this cured beef sat in crocks all winter and was brought out in the Spring to celebrate.