|
Pre-12th Century:
----------------
Christianity arrived in Ireland in the 5th century and was firmly
established by the Viking invasions in the 9th century (?).
The country was split into many kingdoms, generally warring and
feuding, but with a generally recognised "primus inter pares"
or Ard-Ri (High-King). The Ard-Ri-ship was held by the strongest.
Christianity was of the Celtic variety - organised around
abbots and monasteries rather that bishoprics, and with such things
as public confession etc. By the twelfth century, the Vikings
through trading cites like Dublin, Waterford and Limerick had
brought Ireland within the ambit of the European civilization
of the Middle Ages. The church also became reformed at this
time.
Norman Invasion and Colonization: 12th - 15th centuries
------------------------------------------------------
The Normans arrived first as mercenaries to support a local
King in his quarrel with the High-King. However this band of
warriors, the foremost in Europe at that time, stayed to
conquer and claim land for themselves. Their adventures compare
with Cortes in Mexico. Henry II of England fearing another
Norman kingdom in Ireland arrived and claimed the title
"Lord of Ireland" and received the homage of the invaders and
the local kings. The Norman invasion was part of the great
explosion of energy in medieval Europe that included the
Norman conquests of Sicily, the First Crusade, the colonization
of East Prussia and the reconquest of much of Spain from the
Moors.
The Normans did not complete the conquest however, the medieval
English colony was mainly confined to the South-East, with
strong Anglo-Norman enclaves in the cities and fertile valleys.
This was England's first true colony, and many distinctive
"Irish" names date from this time - Roche, Barry, Joyce, Burke etc.
Gradually the colony was weakened though economic decline, the
Black Death and intermarriage with the Irish.
Many of the Anglo-Norman families adopted Irish customs and
became "Hibernicized" - speaking Irish, allying with Irish
chieftains, fostering children with Irish families etc. However
they still formed a distinct group - known as the "Old English"
to distinguish them from later settlers from England.
The country was ruled from England through the great magnates,
usually the Fitzgeralds of Kildare, who supported the Yorkist
side in the War of the Roses but were strong enough to survive
the start of the Tudor regime. However, the Tudors began to
break the power of the big families - first the Kildare
Fitzgeralds, later the Desmond (Southern) Fitzgeralds.
Eventually in 1527 (I think) Henry VIII proclaimed himself
King of Ireland and through a system of "surrender and re-grant"
accepted the homage of the Irish chieftains in return for
English titles - for example, the O'Neills became Earls of Tyrone,
O'Donnells Earls of Tirconnell stc.
Reformation, Rebellion and Plantation 16-17th centuries:
--------------------------------------------------------
Basically, the Irish (Old English and native Irish) did not
care what the English King did not or what his religion was,
however with the Spanish wars, England had a definite strategic
interest in seeing Ireland a quiescent part of its dominions.
The century 1590 - 1690 was a period in which England completed a
campaign of bloody conquest, and colonization by a new wave of
Protestant settlers. Many areas were planted but only
in Ulster did the plantation put down secure roots as many Scots
arrived to take land and settle. In the rest of the country,
the mass confiscations that followed the Cromwellian wars led
to a the creation of a Protestant aristocracy and gentry which
held title of most of the land.
With the Williamite wars (1689-91) and the Treaty of Limerick,
the last hope of Catholic Ireland died. The old Gaelic order finally
passed into history (as it was to do in Scotland after Culloden).
18th Century: Protestant Ascendancy:
-----------------------------------
The Protestant landowners evolved a distinctive colonial society,
which had many cultural achievements - beautiful architecture,
the literature of Swift and Goldsmith, the philosophy of Berkeley
etc. However it overlay a lively subterranean culture that was
Irish speaking and Catholic. The Penal laws passed to deprive
the Irish of participation in public life were gradually relaxed,
however the French Revolution and 1798 Rebellion led to a
new polarization between Protestant and Catholic.
A Parliament existed in Dublin for which Catholics could vote
from the 1790's but was ended by the Act of Union in 1800.
19th Century: Famine and Home Rule:
----------------------------------
Catholic Emancipation or the rights of Catholics to
sit in the Westminster Parliament was conceded in 1828 after
very effective agitation led by Daniel O'Connell.
Population increased alarmingly during the first two decades of
this century, then the rate of increase gradually started to slow.
However, large groups of people, particularly the labouring landless
classes became increasingly marginalised within the rural economy
as they were driven to cultivate poorer and poorer land, and to
become increasingly dependent on the potato as a source of food.
Disaster struck in the 1840's as the potato crop failed for three
years running, resulting in widespread deaths from starvation and
disease particularly in the West. Emigration became the means of
survival and betterment for the great mass of the landless, and
the depopulation of the countryside of a whole class of people
began. Ineffective (and sometimes mean-spirited) attempts at
relief for the distress by the British Goverment led to a later
feeling of residual bitterness among the Irish. In rough figures
1 million people died, and 1 million people emigrated as a direct
result of the famine (that's 25% of the 1845 population).
As this century went on, the power of the Catholic majority (despite
Famine and emigration) continued to grow with respect the the
landowning class - in the "Land War" against landlordism (1880's),
the English Parliament passed many Land Acts in which the Irish
peasantry could buy out their farms with government loans.
Thus the era of the "strong farmer" began and the society of
rural Ireland which had been forming since the Famine was finally
stabilised. The labourers or landless which had been declining
as a class since the Famine continued to disappear from Ireland
leaving a dominant "middle class" of farmers which has been
most influential up to the present day.
A strong Irish party was elected to Westminister under Charles
Stewart Parnell, which allied the parliamentary movement with elements
in the Fenians (a revolutionary group) and the conservative
Catholic element to force "Home Rule" (a movement to return
a Parliament to Dublin). Acting with Gladstone and the Liberals,
two Home rule bills were brought forward in the 1880's but were
defeated, however the aspiration remained.
The "fly in the ointment" was Ulster where a strong and cohesive
Protestant majority with great influence in Britain rejected Home
Rule and threatened to use force to prevent it.
20th Century - up to 1921: Rebellion, Partition and Troubles:
-------------------------------------------------------------
Parnell's party had split after the disasterous divorce case in
which he was involved, but the two elements re-united later. In
1910 the Irish party found itself holding the balance of power
in the English Parliament and made Home Rule the price of its
support to the Liberals.
Before this, a strong Gaelic revival took place in the
country and a literary movement that aroused strong Nationalist
feelings and memories. However, except for a small minority,
Ireland in 1910 was at its most content within the framework
of the United Kingdom.
The people of Ulster rejected Home Rule and set about forming
an armed force to oppose it. An attempt by the British government
to move the army into Ulster was botched when officers made clear
they would not march. Nationalists also set up an armed force
to defend Home Rule. On top of this, the First World War broke
out, which led to Home Rule being put on the statute books, but
with an exclusion clause for some Ulster counties and with
a "stay of execution" until the war was over. Remember, it was
suppose to be over by Christmas!
As the was dragged on, the British government got more and more
unpopular. Finally at Easter 1916, the country was startled to
find that elements of the Nationalist movement who opposed the
war had staged a rebellion in Dublin. This was crushed after a
week with less than 1,000 dead but with the city centre gutted.
Too-harsh countermeasures by the martial law administration
(16 executions of the leaders) swung support behind the insurgents
and led to the success of Sinn Fein ("We Ourselves") in key
by-elections. Adding folly to foolishness, the government tried
to introduce conscription which united every nationalist shade
of opinion against the administration.
In 1918, Sinn Fein almost swept the board in elections, outside
of Ulster, where the Unionists held firm. In 1919, a parliament
met in Dublin ("An Dail") and proclaimed an independent
Republic. On the same date, the military wing of Sinn Fein
(Irish Republican Army) began a campaign of assassination of
policemen and military personnel. The period 1919-21 was a
period of guerilla war in the South ("The Troubles") and of
sectarian strife in the North. This was followed in 1921
by the Anglo-Irish treaty.
20th Century - Post 1921: Partition Confirmed and More Troubles
---------------------------------------------------------------
This gave 26 counties of Ireland the name of "Irish Free State"
and dominion status (like Canada) - the remainder of Ireland
remained part of the United Kingdom but with a parliament of
its own. Curiously the Civil War which followed in the 26
(southern) counties was not fought over the fact of partition
but because many elements of the IRA and Sinn Fein would accept
nothing less than a Republic.
Northern Ireland (6 counties) was given "Home Rule" - a parliament
within the United Kingdom. This was an absolute
irony as they had opposed it so vehemently. However it became
acceptable if applied to a region where Unionists dominated.
In the South, the pro-treaty side won the civil war, though they
lost power to their (parliamentary) opponents 10 years later. After
1922 the southern governments gradually disentangled themselves from
connections with the British crown.. In 1938, the
political party known as "Fianna Fail" led by Eamonn De Valera
promulgated a new constitution under which the country became known
(bilingually) as "Eire/ Ireland", without a Governor-General. In 1948 a
republic was proclaimed and the country left the commonwealth.
Oddly, De Valera was not completely happy with this, as he recognised
that another bridge to the North had been broken.
During the war, De Valera's government was ostensibly neutral,
however historians have been delighted in recent years to bring
to light the manifold ways that Eire assisted the allies. The
latest researcher has gone so far as to say that Ireland was not
really neutral at all (i.e. it went beyond a pragmatic level
of aid). However, the last word on this has not been spoken.
After the setting up of the Republic, the Westminster parliament
passed the Northern Ireland Act, guarantee the position of Northern
Ireland within the United Kingdom as long as a majority of the
people there wished it so. The Irish government agreed to this in the
Anglo-Irish agreement of 1987, however it is contradicted by
the Irish constitution which has a unilateral claim to Northern
Ireland, while recognising "de facto" it is under another
jurisdiction.
Little was done in the South to build bridges to the Unionists,
ritual breast-beating about the evils of partition (especially
near election time) took the place any sort of rational
approach. Indeed, the South passed many illiberal laws regulating
sexual morality that offended the Protestant conscience.
Meanwhile, in the North, the Unionists were content to keep up
the appearance of being under siege as that guaranteed that
on one would break ranks to let in "the enemy".
The Northern Irealnd parliament lasted until 1972
when after the outbreak of the current troubles, the British
government prorogued it. In the words of its first prime minister,
Brookborough, it was "A Protestant parliament for a Protestant
people" - Catholics, though 1/3 of the population, suffered many
civil disabilities and discrimination in jobs and housing.
The British Government disastrously introduced Internment
without trial in 1971, which enormously boosted the
Nationalist terrorist group, the IRA. Ten years later, the BG
made another blunder with ham-fisted handling of IRA hunger
strikers at the Maze prison. This brought Sinn Fein (IRA political
wing) much gains in electoral support, but this has considerably
diminished up to the present, helped by the Anglo-Irish agreement
in 1987. This set up the Anglo-Irish conference which enabled
the Dublin government to raise matters relating to Northern
Ireland directly with the BG.
At this, the Unionists shouted "foul" and began a campaign designed
to destroy the agreement, without success. However, it was always
made clear that the IG and the BG would replace the agreement with
another one, if Unionists participated.
This takes us up to the current talks which may make it possible to
do this (but don't hold your breath!).
|