Irish History

World History > Irish History

• c. 8000 BC - First humans arrive in Ireland from Britain and Spain.
• c. 3500 BC - Neolithic civilization (Newgrange).
• c. 1750 BC - Bronze Age civilization.
• c. 500 BC - Iron Age civilization. The Four Kingdoms of Leinster, Ulster, Munster, and Connaught are formed some time after this, with the seat of the High King at Tara.
• 218 to 254 - Reign of Cormac, height of the pre-Christian era.
• c. 300 - Ogham alphabet developed.
• 379 - Niall of the Nine Hostages becomes High King.

• 432 to 461 - Saint Patrick converts Ireland to Christianity.
• c. 520 - Brendan the Navigator crosses (maybe) the Atlantic Ocean.
• 795 - Vikings sack Ireland for the first time.
• c. 800 - Book of Kells completed.
• 988 - Dublin founded at the site of a Viking settlement.
• 1014 - High King Brian Boru is killed defeating the Vikings at the Battle of Clontarf.

• 1166 - King of Leinster Dermot MacMurrough is kicked out of Ireland after abducting Princess Dervorgilla. He begins recruiting Norman knights in England.
• 1169 - MacMurrough returns to Leinster and The Cambro-Norman invasion of Ireland begins.
• 1170 - Richard Fitzgilbert de Clare, aka Strongbow, lands in Waterford, marries MacMurrough's daughter, and conquers Meath.
• 1171 - Henry II visits Ireland to claim Strongbow's lands.
• 1175 - Treaty of Windsor: Henry II becomes Lord of Ireland.
• 1177 - First settlers at Belfast.
• 1268 - Dublin Castle completed.
• 1315 - Edward Bruce defeats the English and becomes King of Ireland.
• 1318 - Bruce is killed in the Battle of Faughart.
• 1367 - Kilkenny Statutes outlaw hurling and the Irish language, albeit rather ineffectually.
• 1541 - Parliament declares Henry VIII King of Ireland. Protestant settlement of Ireland begins.
• 1579 - Munster Rebellion.
• 1592 - Trinity College founded.
• 1594 - Hugh O'Neill's forces take on the British in the Nine Years' War.
• 1598 - O'Neill defeats the British at the Battle of Yellow Ford.
• 1601 - O'Neill loses at the Battle of Kinsale.
• 1603 - O'Neill surrenders.
• 1607 - The Flight of the Earls.

• 1613 - Large-scale British colonization of Ireland begins.
• 1642 - Irish Confederacy declared in Kilkenny, and supports King Charles against Oliver Cromwell. Adventurers' Act encourages investment in Irish conquest.
• 1645 - England agrees to halt further colonization of Ireland.
• 1649 - Cromwell becomes Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. His troops massacre 1,500 rebels at Drogheda.
• 1653 - Cromwell seizes land from rebels and grants it to his supporters.
• 1662 - Phoenix Park opens.
• 1689 - In the wake of the Glorious Revolution, the Irish parliament acknowledges James II as king.
• 1690 - James II loses to William of Orange at the Battle of the Boyne. In the Peace of Limerick, William grants Catholics limited toleration.
• 1695 - Catholics legally barred from voting, military service, and marriage to Protestants.
• 1742 - Mass immigration from Ulster to America begins.
• 1759 - Guinness brewery founded at St James's Gate.
• 1781 - After the Convention of Dungannon, the Irish parliament gets limited independence.
• 1791 - Wolfe Tone founds the Dublin Society of United Irishmen to work toward equal rights.
• 1793 - Catholics regain the right to vote.
• 1796 - France sends assistance to Irish rebels: a storm breaks up their fleet.
• 1798 - Incorrectly anticipating a French invasion of England, Irish rebels rise against the British, but are defeated at Vinegar Hill. Incorrectly anticipating an Irish victory, France sends more ships to help the Irish, who score some initial victories but surrender to Charles Cornwallis at Ballynamuck. Tone is imprisoned and commits suicide.
• 1800 - Irish parliament dissolves itself, and Ireland goes to direct rule from Westminster on 1 Jan. 1801.
• 1803 - Thomas Emmet's rebels kill the Lord Chief Justice in Dublin.
• 1828 - Daniel O'Connell becomes the first Irish Catholic elected to the House of Commons, but refuses to take the anti-Catholic oath of office.
• 1829 - Roman Catholic Relief Act pushed through Commons by Robert Peel. O'Connell takes his seat in Parliament.
• 1843 - O'Connell and eight others are arrested for conspiracy to overthrow the government through their Repeal Association.

• 1845 to 1851 - Irish Potato Famine. 1 million die; 1.6 million leave the country in coffin ships.
• 1858 - Fenian Brotherhood founded.
• 1867 - Fenians bomb a prison in Clerkenwell, killing 12.
• 1869 - Church of Ireland severed from the state.
• 1870 - Isaac Butt founds the Home Government Association.
• 1879 - Michael Davitt and Charles Stewart Parnell found the Irish Land League.
• 1882 - Parnell reaches the Kilmainham Agreement with the British government, which falls apart four days later after Lord Frederick Cavendish is killed in Dublin.
• 1884 - Gaelic Athletic Association founded.
• 1886 - Irish Home Rule Bill brings down PM William Gladstone.
• 1896 - Abbey Theatre built.
• 1902 - 20,000 rally against stringent British laws at Phoenix Park.
• 1914 - Parliament passes the Home Rule Act, but belays it because of World War I.
• 1916 - Easter Rising. James Connolly, Roger Casement, Padraig Pearse, and other perpetrators are rounded up and executed at Kilmainham.
• 1919 - The Dail Eireann is formed by 25 disgruntled Sinn Fein MPs.
• 1920 - Black and Tans arrive. Government of Ireland Act partitions the island into north and south.
• 1921 - Michael Collins negotiates a treaty with Britain, making the south an autonomous dominion of the Empire. George V opens the Northern Ireland parliament in Belfast.

• 1922 - Dail approves the treaty with Britain over the objections of republicans led by Eamon de Valera. Civil war breaks out between the two factions, and Collins and Griffith are both killed. Irish Free State proclaimed. James Joyce publishes Ulysses, which is initially banned in Ireland.
• 1923 - Civil war ends. William Butler Yeats wins the Nobel Prize for Literature.
• 1927 - Vice president Kevin O'Higgins is assassinated.
• 1932 - Ruling Fine Gael party is defeated by Fianna Fail, and de Valera becomes president.
• 1938 - Ireland, now Eire, severs most connections with Britain. Douglas Hyde becomes the first president of Eire.

• 1949 - Republic of Ireland promulgated.
• 1969 - Over 130 are injured when a group of pro-Catholic marchers clash with unionists. The Troubles begin to heat up.
• 1970 - Irish Arms Trial.
• 1971 - The militant Provisional IRA breaks off from the IRA. British authorities begin preventive detentions, sparking a massive wave of violence in Belfast and other cities.
• 1972 - Bloody Sunday: 13 civil rights protestors are killed in Belfast. The British embassy in Dublin is burned during riots three days later. The UK establishes direct rule in the North and considers forced relocation of Irish Catholics.
• 1973 - Ireland joins the European Economic Community. UK and Ireland agree to a Catholic-Protestant coalition government in the North.
• 1981 - IRA hunger strikers Bobby Sands and Francis Hughes die in prison.
• 1985 - House of Commons votes to give the Republic a consultative role in Northern Ireland (the Anglo-Irish Agreement).
• 1987 - Rememberance Day bombing in Enniskillen.
• 1990 - Mary Robinson elected first female president.
• 1992 - Ireland votes in favor of the European Union.
• 1993 - John Major and Albert Reynolds sign Downing Street Declaration.
• 1994 - The IRA announces a cease fire.
• 1995 - FG's John Bruton negotiates another peace framework.
• 1996 - IRA cease fire ends with bombings in London and Manchester.
• 1997 - Mary McAleese and Bertie Ahern become president and prime minister. IRA cease fire resumes.
• 1998 - Car bombing in Omagh kills 29 and injures 220. Good Friday Agreement.
• 2000 - New government in Northern Ireland becomes operational.
• 2001 - Northern Ireland first minister David Trimble resigns after IRA refuses to disarm.

cheers to ryano and ReiToei for their useful suggestions and nitpicks