In prehistoric times Ireland underwent a number
of invasions from Europe, the most important of which was that of the Gaels in
the 3rd century BC. Gaelic Ireland was divided into kingdoms, nominally subject
to an Ardri or High King; the chiefs were elected under the tribal or Brehon law,
and were usually at war with one another.
Ireland was known to the Romans as Hibernia, but
no invasion was ever attempted. Christianity was introduced by St Patrick about
432, and during the 5th and 6th centuries Ireland became the home of a
civilization which sent out missionaries to Britain and Europe.
From about 800 the Danes began to raid Ireland,
and later founded Dublin and other coastal towns, until Brian Boru (king from
976) defeated them at Clontarf 1014.
Anglo-Norman adventurers invaded Ireland 1167,
but by the end of the medieval period English rule were still confined to the
Pale, the territory around Dublin. The Tudors adopted a policy of conquest,
confiscation of Irish land, and plantation by English settlers, and further
imposed the Reformation and English law on Ireland. The most important of the
plantations was that of Ulster, carried out under James I 1610. In 1641 the
Irish took advantage of the developing struggle in England between king and
Parliament to begin a revolt which was crushed by Oliver Cromwell 1649, the
estates of all "rebels" being confiscated. Another revolt 1689-91 was also
defeated, and the Roman Catholic majority held down by penal laws. In 1739-41 a
famine killed one-third of the population of 1.5 million.
The subordination of the Irish parliament to that
of England, and of Irish economic interests to English, led to the rise of a
Protestant patriot party, which in 1782 forced the British government to remove
many commercial restrictions and grant the Irish parliament its independence.
This did not satisfy the population, who in 1798, influenced by French
revolutionary ideas, rose in rebellion, but were again defeated. In 1800 William
Pitt induced the Irish parliament to vote itself out of existence by the Act of
Union, effective 1 Jan 1801, which brought Ireland under the aegis of the
British crown. During another famine 1846-51, 1.5 million people emigrated,
mostly to the US.
By the 1880s there was a strong movement for home
rule for Ireland; Gladstone supported it but was defeated by the British
Parliament. By 1914, home rule was conceded but World War I delayed
implementation.
The Easter Rising took place April 1916, when
nationalists seized the Dublin general post office and proclaimed a republic.
After a week of fighting, the revolt was suppressed by the British army and most
of its leaders executed.
From 1918 to 1921 there was guerrilla warfare
against the British army, especially by the Irish Republican Army (IRA), formed
by Michael Collins 1919. This led to a split in the rebel forces, but in 1921
the Anglo-Irish Treaty resulted in partition and the creation of the Irish Free
State in S Ireland.
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