John Toland was one of the most remarkable of Swift’s Irish contemporaries. He was a man of many parts and extraordinary versatility: a linguist with some claims to scholarship, a political propagandist and a speculative-thinker. At the same time, he was brash and indiscreet, with the result that he fell out with one patron after another and was forced to make a precarious living as a Grub Street hack. But his writings influenced later generations, were translated into French and German, and gave him an international reputation as one of the forerunners of the age of reason.

National symbols have long been the subject of political controversy in Ireland and remain so today. Although arguments about symbols are now more common in Northern Ireland than in the Irish Republic, the early years of the Irish Free State saw vigorous discussions about the appropriateness of the new state’s symbols. One such debate broke out in 1929, following a dispute between the Free State government and Trinity College, Dublin, over which anthem should be played for the Governor-General. At the time this dispute was described by one political commentator as ‘one of those political storms in a tea-cup in which we delight’, and now, from a distance of almost seventy years, it is perhaps even harder to understand how such passions were roused over a seemingly minor incident. Even teacup storms can provide valuable insights, however, if historians can learn to read the tea-leaves.

One way of studying national anthems is to analyse their texts and compare them with those of other nations in order to obtain ‘an unique view into the polity, its self-conception or self-image, and ultimately, its deepest political aspirations, experiences, goals, and values’. Such an approach, however, takes an ahistorical and essentialist view of the nation or state and loses sight of political divisions within the nation. National anthems must be seen in their historical context: the circumstances of their creation and adoption must be examined, as must the ways in which the meanings attached to them change over time. They often emerge out of political conflict and can become the focus of conflict once again as new political forces come to the fore. Despite the claims of governments and nationalist ideologues, the selection of a national anthem is not a simple expression of ‘national will’.

In the second year of the English civil war both king and parliament sought and received substantial military assistance from outside the kingdom: Charles concluded a truce with the Irish rebels and began the importation of troops from Ireland; parliament negotiated the introduction of an army from Scotland. Historians of the period are agreed that these parallel steps had quite opposite results. While the Scots army is invariably viewed as a ‘big factor in turning the scales against the king’, Charles's importation of Irish soldiers is regarded as having an insignificant impact on his military situation and a disastrous effect upon his popular standing. Parliament's alliance with the Scots has therefore been acclaimed necessary and prudent, Charles's acquisition of Irish help a terrible blunder. Samuel R. Gardiner, in his classic history of the English civil war, singled out the king's importation of Irish troops to England as the act which did most to weaken his authority.

This article examines one of the most intense divisions between Irish nationalists during the Northern Ireland conflict. The Provisional I.R.A. claimed to be waging a similar war to that of the I.R.A. of the revolutionary era (1916–1921); an assertion disputed by many. The argument was significant because all the major political forces in the Irish Republic honoured the memory of what they called the ‘old’ I.R.A. (defined in a popular school history book as ‘the men who fought for Irish freedom between 1916 and 1923’). They argued that in contrast to the Provisionals, the ‘old’ I.R.A. possessed a democratic mandate and avoided causing civilian casualties. Echoes of these disputes resurfaced during Sinn Féin's bid for the Irish presidency during 2011. Commemorating Denis Barry, an anti-treaty I.R.A. prisoner who died on hunger strike in 1923, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin claimed that in contrast to men like Barry ‘those who waged war in Northern Ireland during the more recent Troubles were an impediment to Irish unity and directly responsible for causing distress and grief to many families. Yet they still seek to hijack history and the achievements of the noble people who fought for Ireland in our War of Independence … to justify their terrorist campaign.’

The 1930s in Northern Ireland was a period of rituals, performed for the population at large. Such unionist demonstrations and theatrical set pieces were unique manifestations of unionist culture. In a period of austerity and high unemployment in Northern Ireland, and increasingly aggressive nationalism in the Irish Free State, they were also a response to political developments. The demonstrations of the 1930s provided unionists with a common political tradition with which to identify, as well as an affirmation of the state, particularly through unionist involvement in royal occasions. The colour and drama of these ceremonies was forcefully conveyed through the pages of the main unionist papers, the Belfast Newsletter, the Northern Whig and the Belfast Telegraph, as the theatricality of the third home rule drama had been. The attention given to these rituals in the press in Northern Ireland is important because it was through the press that these often elitist events were made accessible to the population at large. Through press coverage, which was as comprehensive as it was dramatic, the masses were at least given a sense that they were participating in the collective life of their community. The major ceremonial festivals of this decade were those which celebrated Edward Carson: the opening of the Stormont parliament, which was presented as the first monument to the former unionist leader; the unveiling of the statue honouring him in 1933; his funeral in 1935; and the unveiling of a plaque in his honour in 1938. Andrew Gailey has already outlined the way in which Carson’s ‘performances’ were orchestrated in the period of the third home rule crisis. Carson’s appearances were, he argues, limited to ‘maintain an air of mystery’, while unionist meetings were made a ‘social occasion to remember, with large crowds, local bands and choirs and with the entertainment of theatrical parades, inspections, mounted escorts of lancers’. In the 1930s similar theatrical techniques were employed; unionist commemorations in this period were marked by distinctive ceremonial settings, formal speeches and, often, impressive dress. Loudspeakers were installed at the opening of parliament, and also at the unveiling of the Carson statue and during his funeral, in order to enable the audience to feel more intimately involved in the proceedings.

One of the most noticeable features of Irish political life in the 'later eighteenth century, is, that though political power was :oncentrated in comparatively few hands, there was a very large leasure of political freedom. One could in fact sum up the system by saying that it was oligarchy tempered by discussion. As a result, voluntary and unofficial societies and clubs arose for the purpose of educating and influencing public opinion, and were the nuclei of much political thought and action. There [were Whig Clubs, Constitutional Clubs, Societies for the [Preservation of Liberty and Peace and Associations of Independent Voters. Thus there was nothing very strange in the Iformation, in November 1791, of a Dublin branch of the newly bounded Society of United Irishmen. But this group was to prove unique in at least one respect.

The most resounding charge brought during the last two decades against ‘revisionism’ in Irish historiography has been that of a tacit collaboration between historians and the government. This accusation is too serious to be left unexamined. Traditionalists have denounced ‘revisionism’ as a dubious device designed to prop up the border and undo the work of the revolution. Desmond Fennell declared categorically that ‘Both in its ultimate thrust, and as a matter of objective fact, [it] is the historiography of the counter-revolution.’ Séamus Deane defined it as ‘a provincial phenomenon’ and dismissed its practitioners as ‘neo-unionists’.

The relationship of Ireland to the Commonwealth during the period of its membership was a tortuous one. Forced to accept dominion status under threat of the renewal of Anglo-Irish hostilities, Ireland was not an enthusiastic member of the club as were the older dominions. The Constitutional Amendment (No. 27) Bill, enacted on 11 December 1936, removed all references to the crown and governor general from the constitution while the Executive Authority (External Relations) Bill, enacted the next day, recognised the crown only for purposes of diplomatic representation and international agreements. These two measures, commonly referred to as the External Relations Act, left Ireland a more or less undeclared republic with ambiguous links to the Commonwealth. Wartime neutrality differentiated Ireland even further from the other dominions, aroused British anger and brought the question of Ireland's constitutional status into even greater prominence. Ireland was, the Canadian high commissioner in Dublin considered in 1944, a more or less unknown quantity' The Canadian government, though it would have preferred a different choice, respected Ireland's neutrality and resented British actions, taken without prior consultation, that might have contrived to drive Ireland from the Commonwealth. The end of the war removed a major cause of grievance but left Ireland's nosition unresolved.

On 23 May 2006 the Irish Supreme Court declared that the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1935 was inconsistent with the 1937 Constitution. It found that section 1 (1) of the act deprived a man charged with unlawful carnal knowledge of the defence of having made a reasonable mistake as to the age of the girl in question, and therefore of his constitutional right to a trial in due course of law. In his judgment, Mr Justice Adrian Hardiman stated that ‘the Section contains no balance: it wholly removes the mental element and expressly criminalises the mentally innocent. It need not necessarily have done so.’

There must still be room for argument over whether Ireland's ‘war of independence’ was a spontaneous movement of the mass of the people, as Republicans hold, or whether, as the British government liked to suggest, it was essentially the work of a handful of fanatical terrorists. In attempting to resolve this argument, considerable weight must be placed on instances of what would now be called civil resistance—where the government is opposed by ordinary members of the public. Foremost amongst these are politically-motivated industrial actions. It is a curious feature of Irish historiography that very little attention has in fact been paid to the industrial actions which occurred during the Anglo-Irish conflict of 1916-1921, most notably the embargo on the transportation of government forces and munitions implemented by Irish railway workers between May and December 1920.

Desmond Bowen’s recently published ‘Study of Protestant-Catholic relations between the Act of Union and Disestablishment’ has been a well received investigation of the polarisation between evangelical anglicanism and an increasingly ‘Roman’ catholicism. In his view the historically fragmented religio-political culture of pre-nineteenth century Ireland was, after 1822, the perfect battleground for two imperialistic ecclesiastical systems: ‘When protestant proselytising was openly encouraged in parts of the country after 1822 and the movement for emancipation gained momentum, the castigation of religious leaders who urged conciliation instead of confrontation increased.’

Gerald Balfour's appointment as chief secretary for Ireland on 4 July 1895 was as unexpected as it was intriguing. Recording the event in his diary Sir Edward Hamilton, Gladstone's former private secretary and now assistant financial secretary to the Treasury, described it as ‘quite a surprise and a considerable experiment’, and the Carlton Club, noted more for its relentless suspicion of Irish chief secretaries than its welcoming of surprises and experiments, grumbled ominously. After all Gerald Balfour had led an uneventful academic life at Cambridge followed by a back-bench career in the house of commons that had proved neither prominent nor promising, and he clearly owed his new position to the support of his illustrious brother, Arthur, and the unbridled nepotism of his uncle, Lord Salisbury, the prime minister. Like his avuncular patron, he soon developed a weakness for ‘blazing indiscretion’ and in his first major policy speech to his Leeds constituents after his election he spoke of ‘killing home rule with kindness’ This rather glib phrase provoked a furore among the Irish nationalists and aroused the scepticism of many Irish unionists, though, as Gerald Balfour subsequently protested, he was merely echoing the strategy his brother had pursued with full unionist support in the 1880s.

At first sight the choice of the Augustinian priory of Kells in Ossory as the subject of a case study may seem a trifle arbitrary. True, its imposing ruins provide a feast for the archaeologist, but the loss of the original register — in place of which we have to settle for a few pages of tantalising excerpts — leaves the historian with a mere snack. Moreover, the priory falls well short of being a member of the big monastic league: at the Dissolution its income was barely quarter that of the great Augustinian abbey of St Thomas, Dublin. How can one justify choosing a subject which is both poorly documented and undistinguished? The short answer is that it is precisely this lack of distinctiveness which makes it representative of a large proportion of Augustinian houses founded in the wake of the Norman conquest.

Historians of socialist thought have rated the Irish political philosopher and radical economist William Thompson (1778–1833) as the most influential theorist to emerge from the Owenite movement in early nineteenth-century Britain. Indeed, Gregory Claeys has judged him to be that movement's ‘most analytical and original thinker ... and a writer whose subsequent influence upon the history of socialist economic thought has been long established’. Furthermore, stressing Thompson's democratic values, Claeys insists that the Irishman ‘may rightfully be considered the founder of a more traditionally republican form of British democratic socialism’. While Robert Owen is remembered for his ambitious co-operative experiments, he was not a theoretical or deeply reflective writer and his intellectual legacy was minimal. The Corkborn Thompson, on the other hand, wrote assiduously on the theory and practice of early socialism, reputedly influenced Karl Marx and became a key figure in the history of feminism; nonetheless, our knowledge of this important Irish intellectual remains deficient.

In his vivid account of Easter Week 1916, The insurrection in Dublin, the writer James Stephens observed: ‘The finest part of our city has been blown to smithereens, and burned into ashes. Soldiers amongst us who have served abroad say that the ruin of this quarter is more complete than anything they have seen at Ypres, than anything they have seen anywhere in France or Flanders.’ In a letter to his sister, Henry Beater, company secretary of Arnotts, also likened the smouldering ruins of Sackville Street and the adjoining thoroughfares to a scene from the war:

The Irish land act of 1903, commonly known as the Wyndham act, was the most significant achievement of George Wyndham’s term as chief secretary for Ireland. From the time of his appointment in 1900 Wyndham made the formulation of such a bill a first priority for himself and for his principal advisers. His private correspondence, especially that with Arthur Balfour, reveals how determined he was that it should provide, not the stop-gap measure of earlier legislation, but an effective and final solution to the vexed problem of land occupancy in Ireland. In the end, however, the draft legislation owed less to the efforts of Wyndham and his advisers than to his shrewdness in allowing to a conference between landlord and tenant representatives the scope to evolve an agreed solution in line with guiding principles which he had previously enunciated. The resulting act provided the basis for tenant farmers to secure the ownership of their farms, so bringing to an end the land war that had raged in Ireland since the late 1870s.

The 1560s and 1570s saw the development of a new technique to meet the problem of governing Ireland: the establishment of provincial presidencies in Connacht and Munster, with composition agreements to finance these presidencies. This article re-examines the evidence for, and the nature of, the Connacht composition agreements, with particular reference to the lordships of Clanricard and Thomond, and analyses native reaction to the composition. It places the composition within the context of contemporary arguments about reform strategies for Ireland, and, finally, illustrates that the Composition of Connacht was essentially a form of taxation, and not, as historians have traditionally suggested, an agreement dealing with title to land.

English administrative policy in Elizabethan Ireland was influenced by the success of the provincial administrations of Wales and the north of England. This is most clearly reflected in the establishment of provincial presidencies in Connacht and Munster in 1569–70. The driving force behind English schemes for the administration of both provinces was Sir Henry Sidney, a former president of Wales, and lord deputy of Ireland, 1565–71 and 1575–78.

On 11 June 1832 Humphrey O’Sullivan, a schoolteacher living in Callan, County Kilkenny, made the following entry in his diary:

O’Sullivan did not exaggerate. The events which he described were part of a remarkable popular panic which in the space of six days swept across the greater part of Ireland, from County Wexford in the south-east to County Donegal in the north-west, and from County Cork to the outskirts of Dublin city. It was an episode regarded by some contemporary observers with amused condescension, by others with deep alarm. For the modern historian it offers a brief but vivid insight into the mental world of a section of the catholic population in pre-Famine Ireland, and an opportunity to document in detail features of that mental world which are rarely reflected in conventional historical records.

Christine Kinealy has claimed that ‘more has been written to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Great Famine than was written in the whole period since 1850’. This is probably true. Anniversaries of major historical events now give rise to commemorative events ranging from scholarly conferences to the unveiling of memorial plaques, even to pop concerts. There appears to be a premium on being first in the field, and a corresponding waning of interest as attention shifts to the next anniversary. Harvard University organised its conference marking the bicentenary of the French Revolution in 1988. The summer of 1847 was taken as the cutoff point for the Irish government’s official commemoration of the Famine, in order to make way for the bicentenary of 1798, despite the fact that a majority of famine victims probably died after that date. Commemorating historical events boosts book sales, and publishers appear eager to respond to popular demand. Unfortunately the interest may prove too short-lived to afford time for major research, and many of the resulting books either recycle existing material or give the appearance of being in need of further work.