In August of 1849, in London, a huge property was put up for auction: the former Martin Estate in Connemara. According to the prospectus: It is impossible for the mind of man to conceive anything necessary but capital, and a judicious application of it, for rendering this vast Property fertile beyond a parallel, that this … Read more
St Ultan’s Hospital was established in 1919 by Dr Kathleen Lynn and Madeleine ffrench-Mullen in response to socio-medical conditions in Dublin. It was not unusual for women to establish hospitals. This had happened in Britain and the United States in the late nineteenth century to facilitate women’s access to the medical profession. Women on missionary … Read more
The Irish Greyhound pig was a descendant of the European wild pig (Sus scrofa) that had roamed Irish forests since prehistoric times. It was first domesticated in Ireland during the Neolithic. In the early Middle Ages there was not much distinction between the wild pig and the domesticated pig; the domesticated pig was fed on … Read more
After seven decades of ideological, political and economic confrontation, focused on Europe but extending throughout the world—and played out by proxy in Africa and elsewhere—one whole system collapsed within a few years, and by the end of 1991 the communist system had expired in Russia, the land of its birth. Very few predicted such a … Read more
Vilified by her English adversaries as ‘a woman who hath imprudently passed the part of womanhood’, Grace O’Malley was ignored by contemporary chroniclers in Ireland, yet her memory survived in native folklore. Nationalists later lionised her as Gráinne Mhaol, a warrior who would come over the sea with Irish soldiers to rout the English. She … Read more