The Story of Ireland: A History of the Irish People (49 page)
Read The Story of Ireland: A History of the Irish People Online
Authors: Neil Hegarty
Tags: #Non-Fiction
The royal visit – it was generally agreed – passed flawlessly. In its after-math, commentators and political leaders suggested that a line had been drawn under the past: that the disharmony that had characterized the Anglo–Irish relationship over the course of centuries was now ended, once and for all; and that a new partnership of equal sovereign nations had been forged. These are understandable wishes and sentiments, particularly given both the historic nature of the connection between Ireland and the neighbouring island, and the inevitable wish to focus attention on the country’s own present economic and social difficulties. Yet history can never be wished to a conclusion: rather, its legacies must be acknowledged before they can be set aside. Queen Elizabeth’s visit, indeed, demonstrated this simple lesson in actions, symbols and a handful of words: the mere action of squaring up to a troubled past brought with it a sense of release.
Such acknowledgements, however, are not always to be had. Days after the state visit ended, the British foreign secretary, William Hague, announced that government files relating to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 1974 could not for legal reasons be opened for inspection. The full story of these atrocities – in which thirty-three people were killed – remains to be told, and without the co-operation of the British government it is highly unlikely that it ever will.
In Northern Ireland too, the consequences of history continue to unfold – most brutally, perhaps, in the murder in April 2011 of a police constable in County Tyrone. Ronan Kerr died at Omagh when a bomb, planted by dissident republicans, exploded under his car: the impact of his death was felt more keenly, maybe, because Kerr was young, a Catholic and a member of the Gaelic Athletic Association – a powerful emblem, in other words, of the new order evolving in Northern Ireland. His death was an indication of the limits of the success of this new order – and conversely, his funeral was accompanied by a proliferation of symbols which highlighted the changes that had already taken root. Members both of the GAA and of the police service flanked Kerr’s funeral cortege; prominent Unionist politicians and members of the Orange Order participated in the funeral Mass – in some cases, for the first time in their lives. In the still abnormal society of Northern Ireland these were remarkable sights, and indicators of progress towards the creation of a new society.
There have also been warnings, however, of a developing disillusionment with politics as it exists in the province. In the local elections and election to the Northern Ireland Assembly held on 5 May 2011, turnout fell to a historically low level – this in a society which had traditionally boasted extremely high levels of voter participation. It could be argued that this was a good thing: that normal politics were bedding down; that voters were accordingly switching off; that the Northern Ireland public, in failing to vote, was simply following habits established across the mature democracies of the Western world. Yet there is a rather more disturbing lesson to be taken from such trends.
The systems of government and administration established by the Belfast Agreement do not allow for the concept of parliamentary opposition as it exists in other democracies: instead, the governance of Northern Ireland is by enforced consensus, embodied in the province’s five-party Executive or cabinet. While such structures were certainly necessary to break the political freeze that had existed during the Troubles, they have by no means led to nimble or responsive government in the longer term: indeed, the Executive has been not so much sure-footed as lumbering, discordant and procrastinating in the matter of everyday politics. It cannot be positive or healthy if voters are turning their backs on politics, preferring to linger (as local wits put it) in the garden centre rather than the polling booth; and it is an indication that the structures of government established by the Belfast Agreement will in the longer term require adjustment.
Set against this are signs of a wider vision of cultural and political plurality. The splendidly rebuilt Lyric Theatre – the province’s
de facto
national theatre – was inaugurated at Belfast in 2011, its twin stages and modern facilities providing the shared spaces that such a divided society urgently requires. Similarly, the sinuous new footbridge across the river Foyle in Derry has provided both a striking symbolic connection between the two halves of an often fractured city; and an excellent backdrop to Derry’s year as inaugural UK City of Culture in 2013. In fact, it is evident that the city’s bid was successful in part because it undertook to confront and explore the fraught issues of identity that pass like geological fault lines across the terrain of Northern Ireland society.
The identity of Ireland as a whole, indeed, appears malleable as never before. This island’s exposure to the influence and currents of the wider world has in recent decades been emphasized consistently, and in a variety of (not always straightforward) ways: from the stake taken by the White House in the Northern Ireland peace negotiations of the 1990s to the enthusiastic openness of the Republic to the European single currency at the turn of the millennium – and now, to the country’s problematic bail-out by European and international institutions. This internationalism is not likely to diminish in the foreseeable future, particularly while Ireland as a whole grows increasingly dependent on foreign investment and the export trade.
Yet the local texture and rhythms of Irish life have by no means disappeared. Former Irish President Mary Robinson has spoken in moving terms of the Irish tradition of
meitheal
: the acknowledgement of the essential interdependence of Irish communities, and of a willingness to work together in order to achieve common goals; a value system that has proved its worth in times of economic and social difficulty. It is to be hoped that balance and harmony can be found between Ireland’s necessary internationalism and these potent local ties that bind its people together. And one must also hope – perhaps with an even greater sense of urgency – that the political institutions and the leaders that serve this island will not, in the future, be found wanting.
Timeline
BC | |
c | Ice sheets retreat from Ireland |
c | First human presence in Ireland |
c | Neolithic farmers work the Céide Fields |
c | Construction of Newgrange |
AD | |
43 | Roman legions occupy southern Britain |
c | Agricola studies a possible Roman invasion of Ireland |
c | Irish settlement of western Britain begins |
c | First Christian communities in southeastern Ireland |
c | Palladius sent from Rome to minister to the Christian Irish; Patrick begins his ministry |
563 | Foundation of Iona by Colum Cille |
575 | Kingdom of Dál Ríata reaches its height |
590 | Columbanus departs for France |
612 | Foundation of Bobbio by Columbanus |
615 | Death of Columbanus at Bobbio |
635 | Foundation of Lindisfarne by Irish monks |
c | Compilation of |
c | Completion of |
c | Compilation of the |
793 | Beginning of the Viking age: Lindisfarne raided |
795 | First Viking raids on Ireland: monastery on Rathlin Island destroyed |
802 | Iona burned by the Vikings |
837 | Vikings settle at Dublin |
c | Iona is abandoned |
902 | Viking leaders expelled from Dublin |
917 | Vikings return to Dublin |
976 | Dalcassians under Brian Boru capture Limerick |
1002 | Brian Boru rules as high king |
1014 | Battle of Clontarf; death of Brian Boru |
1035 | Foundation of Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin |
1066 | Battle of Hastings – Norman conquest of England |
1132 | Malachy appointed Archbishop of Armagh; papacy asserts its control over Irish Church |
1152 | Henry Plantagenet marries Eleanor of Aquitaine |
1154 | Henry II crowned at Westminster Abbey |
1155 | Laudabiliter |
1166 | Rory O’Connor appointed high king in Dublin. Dermot MacMurrough flees overseas |
1169 | Anglo–Norman capture of Wexford |
1170 | Anglo–Norman capture of Waterford and Dublin; Thomas Becket assassinated in Canterbury Cathedral |
1171 | Death of MacMurrough; Henry II comes to Ireland |
1176 | Death of Strongbow |
1177 | Anglo–Norman conquest of eastern Ulster begins |
1185 | King John in Ireland |
1189 | Giraldus Cambrensis’s |
1204 | Foundation of Dublin Castle; French conquest of Normandy |
1210 | King John campaigns in Ireland and subdues Anglo–Norman rebels |
1215 | Magna Carta |
1216 | Death of King John |
1284 | Formal English subjugation of Wales |
1314 | Battle of Bannockburn |
1315 | Edward Bruce lands in Ireland with a Scottish army |
1316 | Robert Bruce in Ireland |
1317 | Dublin repels a Scottish army; much of the city burned |
1318 | Edward Bruce killed at Dundalk; Scots leave Ireland; |
1337–1453 | Hundred Years War |
1348 | Black Death |
1351 | Statute of Labourers in England |
1367 | Statutes of Kilkenny |
1399 | Richard II visits Ireland; in his absence, his throne is usurped by Henry Bolingbroke (Henry IV) |
1455–85 | Wars of the Roses |
1485 | Henry VII becomes first Tudor monarch |
1487 | Lambert Simnel claims Irish throne; battle of Stoke Field |
1494 | Poynings’ Laws |
1509 | Accession of Henry VIII |
1517 | Martin Luther’s |
1533 | Marriage of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn |
1534 | Rebellion of ‘Silken Thomas’ is defeated |
1537 | ‘Silken’ Thomas Fitzgerald executed |
1539 | Dissolution of the Irish monasteries |
1541 | Henry VIII proclaimed King of Ireland; ‘Surrender and Regrant’ policy begins |
1547 | Accession of Edward VI |
1553 | Accession of Mary I |
1557 | Plantation of King’s and Queen’s Counties |
1558 | Accession of Elizabeth I |
1569–73 | First Munster Rebellion; Catholic uprising in England defeated |
1570 | Elizabeth I excommunicated |
1572 | St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre |
1575 | English massacre of Scots settlers on Rathlin Island |
1578 | Irish collegiate mission – forerunner of the Irish College – established in Paris |
1579–83 | Second Munster Rebellion; unrest spreads across Ireland |
1585 | Plantation of Munster |
1587 | Execution of Mary Stuart |
1588 | Defeat of Spanish Armada; many ships run aground off the Irish coast |
1592 | Foundation of Trinity College Dublin |
1595 | Hugh O’Neill rebels against the Crown |
1596 | Edmund Spenser’s |
1598 | Battle of the Yellow Ford; rebellion extends to Munster |
1600 | An English garrison lands at Derry |
1601 | Battle of Kinsale |
1603 | Surrender of O’Neill; death of Elizabeth and accession of James I |
1606 | Private plantation of Antrim and Down begins; foundation of Irish College at Louvain |
1607 | Flight of the Earls; foundation of Jamestown colony in Virginia |
1608 | Plantation of Ulster begins |
1613 | Foundation of Londonderry |
1620 | Mayflower |
1625 | Accession of Charles I |
1628 | ‘Graces’ agreed between Charles and the Old English in Ireland |
1641 | Outbreak of rebellion in Ulster; English government begins assembling ‘depositions’ |
1642 | English Civil War begins; Charles signs Adventurers’ Act |
1649 | Execution of Charles; Oliver Cromwell lands in Ireland; sack of Drogheda and Wexford |
1650 | Cromwell leaves Ireland |
1652 | Cromwellian Settlement |
1658 | Death of Cromwell |
1660 | Restoration of monarchy; accession of Charles II |
1685 | Accession of James II; revocation of Edict of Nantes |
1688 | Birth of a son to James II and Mary of Modena; William of Orange lands in England and James flees to France; Londonderry closes its gates to James’s supporters |
1689 | James lands at Kinsale and travels north; siege of Derry ends |
1690 | Battle of the Boyne; James returns to France |
1691 | Battle of Aughrim; Treaty of Limerick |
1697 | First penal legislation enacted |
1699 | Woollen Act |
1707 | Union of Scotland and England |
1713 | Jonathan Swift settles in Dublin |
1724 | Swift’s |
1729 | Foundation of Parliament House in Dublin |
1740–1 | Severe famine in Ireland |
1742 | First performance of Handel’s |
1745 | The ‘Forty-Five’: Jacobite uprising in Scotland |
1746 | Battle of Culloden |
1756–63 | Seven Years War |
1776 | American Declaration of Independence |
1781 | Battle of Yorktown ends American War of Independence |
1782 | Legislative independence accorded to Irish parliament |
1789 | Fall of Bastille; beginning of French Revolution |
1791 | Wolfe Tone’s |
1795 | Foundation of Orange Order; foundation of Catholic seminary at Maynooth |
1796 | French expedition enters Bantry Bay but fails to land |
1798 | United Irish rebellion crushed; death of Tone |
1799 | Act of Union rejected in Irish parliament |
1800 | Passing of Act of Union; Maria Edgeworth’s |
1801 | Union of Great Britain and Ireland |
1803 | Robert Emmet’s rebellion |
1808 | Thomas Moore’s first collection of |
1815 | Battle of Waterloo |
1823 | Foundation of Catholic Association |
1824 | Beginning of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland; establishment of free trade area in Britain and Ireland |
1828 | Daniel O’Connell wins Clare by-election |
1829 | Catholic emancipation passed at Westminster |
1832 | Great Reform Bill |
1837 | Accession of Victoria |
1839 | Gustave de Beaumont’s |
1841 | O’Connell becomes Lord Mayor of Dublin |
1842 | Potato blight detected in Europe; first publication of the |
1843 | Monster Meetings across Ireland |
1845 | Beginning of Great Famine |
1847 | Death of O’Connell at Genoa |
1848 | Young Ireland rebellion |
1849 | Famine begins to peter out; first visit of Victoria to Ireland |
1852 | Paul Cullen appointed Archbishop of Dublin |
1858 | Foundation of Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) |