Nick Maxwell What is the origin of the word ‘brasil’? In my homeland, Brazil, it seems that everyone knows the answer. Following the definition of the German naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, it comes from brasa and is associated with the reddish colour of brazilwood (pau-brasil in Portuguese), a dyewood tree commonly found along the Atlantic coast of … Read more
Whitley Stokes’s translation into English of the Danish ballad describes the heroine Hellelil, who is actively involved in her downfall, the loss of her chastity, and the death of both her lover and herself. The poem tells of how her ‘father gave me a glorious guard: twelve noble knights were my watch and ward’. Hellelil … Read more
During the Cuban revolt of 1895–8, culminating in the Spanish–American War, the Parnellite party and their newspaper, the Irish Daily Independent, identified wholeheartedly with the Cubans, advocated American intervention and gave sustained support to the American war effort. This derived from the personal connections of some individuals associated with the Independent (including a wealthy American … Read more
The late 1720s and early 1730s were a period of economic despair in Ireland, as trade stagnated and a succession of poor harvests brought famine and disease. Against this background, anger at bankers and a general distrust of the ‘monied’ section in society became recurring themes in a vigorous pamphlet literature, which considered the causes … Read more
The pamphlet was the most important vehicle for public debate in mid-eighteenth-century Ireland. Pamphlets published in the period between the mid-1720s and the Lucas affair of 1749 were notable for the prominence given to economic issues. The British connection, which had been central to pamphlet debate in Ireland in the early part of the eighteenth … Read more