$Unique_ID{COW01834}
$Pretitle{423}
$Title{Ireland
History}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Embassy of Ireland, Washington DC}
$Affiliation{Embassy of Ireland, Washington DC}
$Subject{irish
ireland
century
parliament
king
political
rule
home
new
war}
$Date{1990}
$Log{Religious Artifacts*0183401.scf
}
Country:     Ireland
Book:        Facts About Ireland. 1990
Author:      Embassy of Ireland, Washington DC
Affiliation: Embassy of Ireland, Washington DC
Date:        1990

History

[See Religious Artifacts: Courtesy Embassy of Ireland, Washington DC.]

Prehistory

     The earliest settlers arrived in Ireland around 6,000 BC in the
mesolithic or middle stone-age period. They arrived in the north across the
narrow strait from Britain. These people were dominantly hunters.

     Colonists of the neolithic, or new stone-age, period reached Ireland
around 3,000 BC. These people were farmers who raised animals and cultivated
the soil. Many remnants of their civilization - houses, pottery,
implements - have been excavated at Lough Gur in Co. Limerick and some can be
seen at the folk park now developed around the lakeside site. The neolithic
colonists were largely self-sufficient but did engage in a limited form of
trading in products such as axe-heads. Many of their religious monuments have
survived, the most impressive of which is the great megalithic tomb at
Newgrange in Co. Meath.

     Prospectors and metalworkers reached Ireland about 2,000 BC. Metal
deposits were discovered and soon bronze and gold objects were being
manufactured. Many artifacts made by these bronze-age people have been found,
among them axe-heads, pottery and jewellery. About 1,200 BC another movement
of people reached Ireland, producing an even greater variety of weapons and
artifacts. A common type of dwelling in use at this time was the crannog, an
artificial island, pallisaded on all sides, constructed in the middle of a
lake.

     The people who made the greatest impact on Ireland were the Celts. The
earliest waves of Celtic invaders may have reached Ireland from central Europe
as early as the 6th century BC with subsequent groups arriving up to the time
of Christ. The Celts belonged linguistically to the great Indo-European
family. They soon came to dominate Ireland and the earlier settlers.

     The Celtic culture of the La Tene civilization - named after a Celtic
site in Switzerland - reached Ireland around the 2nd century BC.

     Celtic Ireland was not unified politically but it was by culture and
language. The country was divided into about 150 miniature kingdoms, each
called a tuath. A minor king ruled a tuath, subject to a more powerful king
who ruled a group of tuatha, who was in turn subject to one of the five
provincial kings. This political situation was very fluid, with constant
shifts in power among the most important contenders.

     Celtic Ireland had a simple agrarian economy. No coins were used and the
unit of exchange was the cow. People lived on individual farms and there were
no towns. Society was rigidly stratified into classes and was regulated by the
Brehon Laws, an elaborate code of legislation based largely on the concepts of
the tuath as the political unit and the fine, or extended family, as the
social unit.

Early Christian Period

     Christianity was introduced into Ireland in the 5th century. This is
traditionally associated with St Patrick (d. 461) although there were some
Christians in Ireland before his arrival. It is from this period that the
first written documents date. A distinctive feature of the development of
early Irish Christianity was the important role played by monasticism. The
great monasteries such as Glendalough, founded by St Kevin, and Clonmacnoise,
founded by St Ciaran, were famous centres of culture and learning and the
illuminated manuscripts which they produced were one of the great glories of
Irish monasticism.

     It was through the monasteries that Irish influence on Britain and Europe
was exerted from the 6th century onwards. Setting out first as pilgrims, Irish
monks preached the Gospel and established new communities right across the
continent. Ireland, unlike most of the rest of Europe, did not suffer
barbarian invasion and so acted as a repository of Christian civilization at a
time when it was almost extinguished elsewhere. Irish monks are associated
with a number of continental centres - St Fursey at Peronne in France, St
Kilian at Wurzburg in Germany, St Vergil at Salzburg in Austria, St Columbanus
at Bobbio in Italy. The Irish brought Christianity to pagan peoples,
established centres of learning and paved the way for the intellectual
flowering in 9th century France known as the Carolingian Renaissance. One of
the most notable of these Irishmen was the philosopher and theologian John
Scotus Eriugena.

     The successful missionary efforts of the Irish abroad were matched by
rich cultural achievements at home. Elaborate chalices, croziers and
ornamental jewellery were fashioned while the monastic scribes committed the
rich classical tradition to their magnificently illuminated manuscripts. This
period from the 6th to the 9th century has been seen by many as the Golden Age
of Irish history.

The Middle Ages

     From around 800 onwards Ireland was attacked by bands of Viking
marauders. The raids continued right through the 9th century and a second
major wave began early in the 10th century. The monasteries, as the major
centres of population and wealth, were a main target of the Vikings. They were
despoiled of their books and valuables and many of them were burned. These
attacks, and attacks by the Irish themselves, contributed to the decline of
the great Irish monastic tradition at this period.

     The Vikings were great traders and did much to develop trade in medieval
Ireland. It was they who founded most of the major towns such as Dublin, Cork,
Limerick and Waterford.

     The lack of any political unity in Ireland made it difficult to resist
the Viking attacks. However, the strength of the Ui Neill kings in the
northern half of the country prevented the Vikings from establishing
themselves there. Towards the end of the 10th century a new dynasty emerged in
Munster in the south and, under the kingship of Brian Boru, was able to match
the Ui Neill. Brian Boru defeated the Vikings in 999 and in 1002 he won
recognition as king of all Ireland. The Vikings intervened regularly in the
disputes between the Irish kings. Their support for a Leinster revolt against
Brian Boru led to their defeat at the Battle of Clontarf in 1014, after which
the Vikings were confined to a subsidiary role in Irish political history.

     The 11th and 12th centuries were an age of renaissance and progress in
Ireland. Cultural activity and the arts prospered. It was a great era of
religious reform and a powerful effort was made to bring the Irish church more
fully into line with Roman orthodoxy. Two of the principal figures of this
movement were St Malachy of Armagh (d. 1148) and St Laurence of Dublin (d.
1180). In the politics others sought to follow Brian Boru's example and
establish themselves as kings of all Ireland. At various times between 1014
and 1169 the kings of Munster, Ulster, Connacht and Leinster succeeded in
doing so. The general trend in Ireland was towards the development of a strong
centralised monarchy on the European model.

     This trend was interrupted by the arrival of the Normans in 1167-69. The
first Normans came to Ireland from south Wales at the invitation of Diarmait
Mac Murchada, king of Leinster, to support his ambition to become king of all
Ireland. Mac Murchada was succeeded as King of Leinster by the leader of the
Normans, Richard de Clare, known as Strongbow. In 1171 the Normans' overlord,
Henry II, King of England, came to Ireland and was recognised as overlord of
the country by both Irish and Normans. Thus began the political involvement
of England in Ireland which was to dominate Irish history in succeeding
centuries.

     The Normans quickly came to control three quarters of the country. In
time, they were gradually assimilated with the local population until they
became, it was said, more Irish than the Irish themselves. The Normans had a
major impact on the country. Throughout the 13th century they developed in
Ireland the same type of parliament, law and system of administration as in
England.

     However, the native, or Gaelic, Irish did exert pressure on the Norman
colony. Outside the colony attempts were made to reestablish the native
kingship. Edward Bruce, brother of the Scottish king Robert, failed in his
attempt in 1315, the last serious effort to overthrow Norman rule. By the end
of the 15th century, due to the depredations of the Irish and the
Gaelicisation of the leading Norman families, the area of Norman rule in
Ireland had shrunk to a small enclave round Dublin known as the Pale.

Early Modern Period

     In the 16th century the Tudor monarchs began a reconquest of Ireland.
Henry VIII declared himself king of Ireland in 1541, the first English
monarch to do so. The Tudors introduced new English settlers to Ireland and
embarked on a series of military campaigns against the Gaelic Irish and the
great Anglo-Norman lords who had fallen away in their allegiance to the Crown.
When the army of Elizabeth I defeated the Irish at the battle of Kinsale in
1601, it marked the beginning of a new order. The native political system was
overthrown and for the first time all Ireland was run by a strong English
central government.

     From the 16th century onwards the English government in Ireland
made strenuous efforts to impose the Protestant religion. However, the
reformed religion did not really take root, largely due to its close
association with the repressive policies of the English administration. The
main exception was in Ulster where the government promoted a successful
colonization of Irish lands by new settlers, mostly Scottish Presbyterians.

     Religion added complexity to the political situation in Ireland. The new
colonists were Protestant and formed a distinct group from the Old English,
the remnants of the Anglo-Irish colony, who were still Catholic and
increasingly disaffected from the government. To a large extent political
power and office were now in the hands of the colonists, the New English.
When the Gaelic Irish of Ulster rebelled against the government in 1641 they
were soon joined by their Old English co-religionists. In 1642 a rebel
assembly, the Confederation of Kilkenny, met, but divisions soon appeared as
Ireland became enmeshed in the English civil war between King and Parliament.
The Irish rebellion was ruthlessly crushed by Oliver Cromwell and his
parliamentary army.

     Under Cromwell there was further Protestant colonization. This time the
large-scale confiscation of land and the banishment of its former owners to
the poorer areas of the country ensured that property and political power
passed to the new Protestant colonists. The accession of the Catholic King
James II in 1685 changed the situation somewhat. However, his pro-Catholic
stance was unpopular in England and Scotland and among the Ulster Scots in
Ireland. When William of Orange challenged James II for the throne all
Ireland except Ulster backed James. The two kings contested their throne in
Ireland and William emerged victorious after a famous series of battles, the
most famous being William's defeat of James at the Boyne in 1690. William's
victory in the war left the Irish Catholics politically helpless and
made possible the Protestant ascendancy that followed. Many leading Catholics
like Patrick Sarsfield (James' commander in chief) left Ireland to serve in
continental armies.

18th Century

     Throughout the 18th century Irish Catholics were seen as a threat who
might rally in support of a Stuart attempt to regain the English throne. The
government enforced a severe code of penal legislation against Catholics.
The Presbyterians also suffered religious disabilities but on a much lesser
scale. Power was concentrated in the hands of the small Protestant ascendancy.

     The American War of Independence had an important influence on Irish
politics. The American example encouraged the Irish Protestant ascendancy to
press for a measure of colonial self-government. In 1782 the Irish parliament,
hitherto subservient to London, was granted independence and now Ireland
was effectively a separate kingdom sharing a monarch with England, but the
Dublin administration was still appointed by the king. One of the leading
figures in this parliament was Henry Grattan. From 1778 onwards the penal
legislation against Catholics was gradually repealed. The Irish parliament
made moves to improve and liberalise trade.

     The French Revolution, with its ideas of equality and liberty, had a
major impact on Ireland. A society called the United Irishmen was founded in
1791 to press for radical reform of the system. It was mainly comprised of
Presbyterians from the north. The leading figures were Wolfe Tone, Napper
Tandy and Lord Edward Fitzgerald. The war with France led to severe military
repression in Ireland. The United Irishmen rebelled in 1798, aiming to unite
Catholics and Protestants, including Presbyterians, and to break Ireland
link with England. In spite of French help the rebellion was badly organised
and easily suppressed.

     After the defeat of the 1798 rebellion, the London Government decided to
unite the British and Irish parliaments. The Irish parliament, an
unrepresentative assembly, was induced to vote itself out of existence in
1800.

Modern Ireland

     From 1801 onwards Ireland had no Parliament of its own; Irish MPs (drawn
from the ascendency) sat in the Westminster parliament in London where they
were in a small minority. Westminster was unwilling to grant major concessions
to Irish Catholics, despite persistent agitation. In 1823 a Catholic
barrister, Daniel O'Connell, established the Catholic Association to press for
full liberty for Catholics and rapidly converted it into a political
mass-movement. O'Connell's success forced the London parliament to grant
Catholic Emancipation in 1829, removing virtually all the disabilities against
Catholics.

     O'Connell, the most popular figure in the country, now sought repeal of
the Act of Union of 1800 and the restoration of the Irish parliament. He set
up a Repeal Association and modelled his campaign on that for emancipation.
The agitation was characterised by mass meetings, some attracting hundreds of
thousands of people. The London government resisted and when a Dublin rally
was banned in 1843, O'Connell complied. This marked the effective end of the
repeal campaign.

     In the 1840s a group of men formed the Young Ireland movement. The most
influential of them was Thomas Davis who, like the United Irishmen, expressed
a concept of Irish nationality embracing all who lived in Ireland, regardless
of creed or origin. The Young Irelanders staged a small insurrection in 1848
which failed but their ideas strongly influenced later generations.

     The end of war in Europe in 1815 had a drastic impact on the Irish
economy. The war had led to a huge growth in tillage farming to supply the
armies, and a dependence on the potato as a staple food. When war ended there
was a change from tillage to pasture, causing agrarian unemployment.
Population increased rapidly and reached 8 million by 1841, two thirds of whom
depended on agriculture. In this precarious agrarian economy the failure of
the potato crop in 1846, due to blight, proved disastrous. The crop failed
again in 1847 and 1848 and, coupled with severe weather, the result was
famine. By 1851 the population of Ireland had been reduced by 2 million due to
starvation, disease and emigration to Britain and North America.

     The latter half of the 19th century was characterised by campaigns for
national independence and land reform. The Irish Republican Brotherhood, also
known as the Fenians, was a secret society founded in 1858 which rejected as
futile constitutional attempts to gain Irish independence. Among the leaders
of the Fenians were James Stephens and John O'Leary. The Fenians staged an
armed uprising in 1867. The rising was no more than a token gesture and was
easily put down but the IRB continued in existence.

     A constitutional movement seeking Home Rule for Ireland was set up by
Isaac Butt. The Home Rulers, wanting a separate Irish parliament subordinate
to London, won half the Irish seats in the 1874 election. Leadership of the
movement soon passed to Charles Stewart Parnell.

     The strained relations between landlords and their tenant farmers were a
constant social and political difficulty. In 1879 Michael Davitt founded the
National Land League. It aimed to secure basic rights for
tenant-farmers - fair rent, free sale and fixity of tenure. Parnell became
president of the movement. Many Fenians also joined. The result was a great
national campaign of mass agitation from 1879 to 1882 which forced the British
government to pass a series of Land Acts. These eventually abolished the old
landlord system and transferred ownership of the land to the people who worked
it.

     Parnell then used the agrarian movement as the basis to agitate for Home
Rule in the 1885 election. The Home Rule party swept the country outside
eastern Ulster. Gladstone, the British Prime Minister, responded by
introducing a Bill in Parliament to grand Home Rule to Ireland but this was
defeated in 1886. as was another in 1894. The impetus of the Home Rule
campaign was really lost with the death of Parnell in 1891.

     However, the years after Parnell's death saw the growing emergence of an
Irish cultural nationalism. The Gaelic Athletic Association, founded in 1884,
promoted the Irish national games while the Gaelic League, founded in 1893 by
Douglas Hyde and Eoin MacNeill, tried to revive the Irish language and culture
on a nationwide basis. At the same time Arthur Griffith developed a new
political party in the period 1905-08 known as Sinn Fein - 'we ourselves'.
The Sinn Fein policy was that Irish MPs should withdraw from Westminster and
establish an independent Irish parliament. Sinn Fein had close links with the
IRB. The Dublin labour dispute of 1913 produced another group, the Irish
Citizen Army, which was socialist but also seperatist. In 1912 another Home
Rule bill was introduced in Westminster. This brought considerable success to
the Irish Parliamentary Party, now led by John Redmond. However, resistance to
the measure was strong in north-east Ulster. It was led by Sir Edward Carson
who set up the Ulster Volunteers to oppose Home Rule. In response, the Irish
Volunteers, largely controlled by the IRB, were founded in Dublin.

     The outbreak of war in 1914 ended immediate hopes for Home Rule. John
Redmond encouraged Irishmen to enlist the British Army hoping this would
sustain British support for Home Rule. Others disagreed with this policy and
in 1916 the Irish Volunteers, led by Padraic Pearse and the Irish Citizen
Army led by James Connolly, staged a rebellion against British rule.

     The Easter Rising of 1916 was put down but the decision of the British to
execute several of the leaders alienated Irish public opinion and in the 1918
general election Sinn Fein totally defeated the Irish Parliamentary party.

     The Sinn Fein representatives now constituted themselves as the first
Dail, or independent Irish Parliament, in Dublin. The Dail was headed by
Eamon De Valera. The British attempt to smash Sinn Fein led to the War of
Independence of 1919-21. The Irish forces were led by Michael Collins. After
more than two years of guerilla struggle a truce was agreed. In December 1921
an Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed and 26 counties of Ireland, known as the
Irish Free State, gained independence. Six Ulster counties had been granted
their own parliament in Belfast in 1920 and remained within the United
Kingdom.

     The establishment of the Free State was followed by a civil war between
the new Government and those who opposed the Treaty. Eamon De Valera led those
who opposed the treaty. A truce was negotiated in May 1923 but the Civil War
claimed the lives of many who had been prominent in the struggle for
independence, among them Michael Collins and Cathal Brugha.