Nick Maxwell The Boyle family archive, known as the Lismore Papers, is one of the most important archival collections for the study of seventeenth-century Ireland. It is split into two collections, one of which is located in the National Library of Ireland in Dublin, and the other at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. The archive comprises thousands of … Read more
In 2012 the Irish Research Council agreed to fund an interdisciplinary project on ‘The Colonial Landscapes of Richard Boyle, First Earl of Cork, c. 1602–1643’, involving a team of historians and archaeologists at University College Cork under the leadership of Dr David Edwards. The project set out to reconstruct Boyle’s vast estate, charting its extent, … Read more
At the beginning of the 1590s Ireland stood on the brink of a new era that would forever alter the economic, cultural and social characteristics of its people. The catalyst for these changes was the Nine Years War (1595–1603). In this period Gaelic military power reached its zenith, but it perversely ended with the completion … Read more
In historical circles there has been disagreement over Tyrone’s role in the war prior to February 1595. There is no known document that definitively shows that he was directing the conflict in 1593 and 1594, but there is substantial circumstantial evidence. Aside from the wholesale involvement by members of his household and family, Tyrone attended … Read more
In the article ‘William Martin Murphy: patriotic entrepreneur or “a soulless, money-grubbing tyrant”?’ (HI 21.4, July/Aug. 2013), a sidebar (‘Early life’) states that he was an ‘only child’. In fact, an older sister, Margaret, was born on 16 April 1843. On 7 January 1872 she married John Cullinane, a successful merchant in Bantry, Co. Cork. … Read more