The three primary dynamics of medieval society were the control of the production of wealth, the raising of armies for war, and the administration of justice for the achievement of civic order. Such functions did not operate in a vacuum but used a hierarchical spatial system, or a system of local, regional and provincial territorial … Read more
From about 1730 Ireland experienced a series of communications developments that pro-foundly altered the opportunities to move around the island. Road, canal and, later, rail initiatives meant that by about 1860 a communications revolution had occurred. A wide-ranging ‘time–space compression’, as it is termed by some geographers, radically reduced the time, and to some extent … Read more
‘Depression or no depression, the cinema grows more popular everyday in Ireland—already there are more than 30 cinemas in Dublin with more to come. In face of these facts, it may seem perverse to ask if anyone in Ireland is really interested in the cinema at all’ (‘Film Notes’, Irish Times, 29 June 1935, p. … Read more
Wijtschate-Messines Ridge was a battle that some believed presented an opportunity for reconciliation between the two political traditions in Ireland—British unionism and Irish nationalism. If Irishmen could fight and die together, surely they could live together. The symbolism was not lost on politicians, particularly nationalists. In December 1916, Willie Redmond MP wrote to his friend … Read more
The kaleidoscope of history The Flight of the Earls is one of those iconic episodes that represents a seismic shift in Irish history, nothing less than the eclipse of the old Gaelic order and its replacement by a new colonial dispensation, exemplified by the Plantation of Ulster. Inevitably it is a story of loss, expropriation … Read more